Study on heat transfer characteristics of reactor cavity cooling system using radiation

Banno, Masaki*; Funatani, Shumpei*; Takamatsu, Kuniyoshi  

A fundamental study on the safety of a passive cooling system for the reactor pressure vessel (RPV) with radiative cooling is conducted. The object of this study is to demonstrate that passive RPV cooling system with radiative cooling is extremely safe and reliable even in the event of natural disasters. Therefore, an experimental apparatus, which is about 1/20 scale of the actual cooling system, was fabricated with several stainless steel containers. The surface of the heating element in the experimental apparatus simulates the surface of the RPV, and the heating element generates natural convection and radiation. As a result of the experiments, we succeeded in visualizing the natural convection in the experimental apparatus in detail.