BWR ex-vessel steam explosion analysis with MC3D code

Abstract

A steam explosion may occur, during a severe reactor accident, when the molten core comes into contact with the coolant water. A strong enough steam explosion in a nuclear power plant could jeopardize the containment integrity and so lead to a direct release of radioactive material to the environment. To resolve the open issues in steam explosion understanding and modeling, the OECD program SERENA phase 2 was launched at the end of year 2007, focusing on reactor applications. To verify the progress made in the understanding and modeling of fuel coolant interaction key phenomena for reactor applications a reactor exercise has been performed. In this paper the BWR ex-vessel steam explosion study, which was carried out with the MC3D code in conditions of the SERENA reactor exercise for the BWR case, is presented and discussed. The premixing simulations were performed with two different jet breakup modeling approaches and the explosion was triggered also at the expected most challenging time. For the most challenging case, at the cavity wall the highest calculated pressure was {approx}20 MPa and the highest pressure impulse was {approx}90 kPa.s. (authors)