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Yamashita, Shinichiro; Nagase, Fumihisa; Kurata, Masaki; Kaji, Yoshiyuki
Proceedings of Annual Topical Meeting on LWR Fuels with Enhanced Safety and Performance (TopFuel 2016) (USB Flash Drive), p.21 - 30, 2016/09
Fuel rod, channel box, and control rod designed with new materials and concepts have been developed in Japan for increasing accident tolerance of LWRs. In order to efficiently and properly implement the accident tolerant fuels (ATFs) and the other components, it is necessary not only to accumulate fundamental and practical data but also to consider technology readiness, recognize knowledge gaps, and establish strategy for design and fabrication. The Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) has established the above "technical basis" and drafted a research plan towards implementation of the ATFs and components as a program sponsored and organized by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI). It is useful to take advantage of the experiences in commercial uses of zirconium-base alloys in LWRs and, therefore, JAEA has conducted this METI project in cooperation with power plant providers, fuel venders, research institutes and universities who have been involved in the development of the ATF materials. The present paper describes the main results of the project conducted to establish the technical basis of the ATFs and components.
Ota, Hirokazu*; Nakamura, Kinya*; Ogata, Takanari*; Nagase, Fumihisa
Proceedings of Annual Topical Meeting on LWR Fuels with Enhanced Safety and Performance (TopFuel 2016) (USB Flash Drive), p.159 - 168, 2016/09
Control rods can be disintegrated and neutron absorber would be removed from the core region before most of the fuel pins are still not damaged seriously in severe accidents of LWRs. The present study investigates a concept of accident tolerant control rod (ATCR) with the following characteristics; (1) sufficiently-high melting and eutectic temperatures, (2) high miscibility with molten and solidified fuel materials, and (3) enough control rod worth. It has been shown that rare-earth sesqui-oxides are expected to be compatible with iron up to higher temperatures than the melting points of structure materials of control rods, and that Sm
O
, EuO, GdO, DyO or their mixtures with HfO are available as alternative neutron absorbers to conventional Ag-In-Cd alloy.
Amaya, Masaki; Udagawa, Yutaka; Narukawa, Takafumi; Mihara, Takeshi; Taniguchi, Yoshinori
Proceedings of Annual Topical Meeting on LWR Fuels with Enhanced Safety and Performance (TopFuel 2016) (USB Flash Drive), p.53 - 62, 2016/09
In order to evaluate adequacy of present safety criteria and safety margins in terms of advanced fuels and provide a database for future regulation on them, JAEA started an extensive research program called ALPS-II program, which has been sponsored by NRA, Japan. This program is primarily composed of tests simulating a RIA and a LOCA on the high-burnup advanced fuels irradiated in commercial PWR or BWR. Recently, the failure limits of the high-burnup advanced fuels under RIA conditions were investigated at NSRR, and post-test examinations on the fuel rods after the pulse irradiation tests are being performed. In terms of the simulated LOCA test, integral thermal shock tests and high temperature oxidation tests were carried out at RFEF, and the fracture limits, high temperature oxidation rate, etc. of the high-burnup advanced fuel cladding were investigated. This paper mainly describes some recent experimental results obtained in this program with respect to RIA and LOCA.
Negyesi, M.; Amaya, Masaki
Proceedings of Annual Topical Meeting on LWR Fuels with Enhanced Safety and Performance (TopFuel 2016) (USB Flash Drive), p.1065 - 1074, 2016/09
Taniguchi, Yoshinori; Udagawa, Yutaka; Amaya, Masaki
Proceedings of Annual Topical Meeting on LWR Fuels with Enhanced Safety and Performance (TopFuel 2016) (USB Flash Drive), p.229 - 238, 2016/09
Miwa, Shuhei; Di Lemma, F. G.; Nakajima, Kunihisa; Osaka, Masahiko
Proceedings of Annual Topical Meeting on LWR Fuels with Enhanced Safety and Performance (TopFuel 2016) (USB Flash Drive), p.861 - 868, 2016/09
The basic studies have been performed for the evaluation of boron (B) release from the degraded BWR control rod material and its effect on cesium (Cs) and iodine (I) chemistry during a severe accident. The B effect on Cs and I chemistry was evaluated by thermal equilibrium calculation considering the change in B release behavior under the degradation of BWR control rod material. Results shows that The generation of gaseous iodine as well as CsBO could be suppressed under a steam-starvation atmosphere because of a lower B release fraction owing to the possible formation of stable iron Fe-B alloys. In response to this prediction result, the basic experiments and analyses are underway. The B release behavior from the boron carbide/stainless steel/Zircaloy reaction products, the thermochemical properties and phase states of complex Cs-B-O compounds are being studied. For the validation of all these evaluation results, reproductive test for FP release and transport will be performed.
Shibata, Hiroki; Tokushima, Kazuyuki; Sakamoto, Kan*; Kurata, Masaki
Proceedings of Annual Topical Meeting on LWR Fuels with Enhanced Safety and Performance (TopFuel 2016) (USB Flash Drive), p.1033 - 1042, 2016/09
To understand the degradation process of control blade channel, control blade degradation tests using sim-materials were performed under various atmospheres with the temperature increase and temperature gradient conditions. In the steam atmosphere with a flow rate of 0.0125 g/s/rod, control blade, channel box, and fuel rods were degraded, especially at the upper part of the test piece, which was similar to that observed in argon atmosphere test. However, the observed degradation was rather different at a flow rate of 0.0417 g/s/rod. At the upper part of the test piece, only the control blade was degraded preferentially and did not react with channel box wall. In contrast, the eutectic reaction of S.S./B
C-melt and Zry occurred at the lower part. These observations suggested the existence of a threshold condition for the control rod degradation between 0.0125 and 0.0417 g/s/rod which is significantly affected by the thickness of the oxide layer on Zry.
Tokushima, Kazuyuki; Shirasu, Noriko; Hoshino, Kuniyoshi*; Ohara, Hiroshi*; Kurata, Masaki
Proceedings of Annual Topical Meeting on LWR Fuels with Enhanced Safety and Performance (TopFuel 2016) (USB Flash Drive), p.1055 - 1063, 2016/09
At the fuel assembly degradation stage in severe accidents, chemical features of the intermediate products are expected to be changed depending upon the accident progressions. These differences are originated from the differences in oxygen potential and temperature, and are highly important for evaluating the relocation and stratification progress of the fuel debris. Two types of sim-test with the different oxygen potentials were performed to investigate these tendencies. The chemical features of the intermediate materials used in the tests were determined from the observations for the control blade and channel box degradation in our previous study. The present results indicate that the U concentration in the metallic layer is largely varied depending upon the oxygen potential of the atmosphere. Also, when the BC-Fe alloy, as of a typical intermediate product, coexists with UO and Zr, the apparent red-ox reaction rate between UO and Zr are mitigated.