Uncertainty analysis of toxic gas leakage accident in cogeneration high temperature gas-cooled reactor

Sato, Hiroyuki; Ohashi, Hirofumi

Mechanical Engineering Journal (Internet), 7(3), p.19-00332_1 - 19-00332_11, 2020/06

https://doi.org/10.1299/mej.19-00332

An uncertainty analysis method for control room habitability under toxic gas leakage accidents in cogeneration HTGR is proposed to support risk-informed design of the plant. The method is applied to representative toxic gas leakage accidents in a IS process hydrogen production plant coupled to the HTTR gas turbine test plant. Epistemic and aleatory uncertainties for each variable parameter are identified and are propagated using Latin hypercube sampling. The analyses show that the suggested method can successfully characterize and quantify uncertainties in the toxic gas concentration in control room. The results lead us to the conclusion that toxic gas dispersion behavior analysis should combine two evaluation methods: dense gas dispersion model and computational fluid dynamics simulation.

Research and development for safety and licensing of HTGR cogeneration system

Sato, Hiroyuki; Aoki, Takeshi; Ohashi, Hirofumi; Yan, X. L.

Nuclear Engineering and Design, 360, p.110493_1 - 110493_8, 2020/04

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nucengdes.2019.110493

JAEA has been conducting research and development with a central focus on the utilization of HTTR, the first HTGR in Japan, towards the realization of industrial use of nuclear heat. On the basis of licensing experience through the HTTR construction, JAEA initiated an activity to establish an international safety standard for licensing of commercial HTGR cogeneration systems fully taking into account safety features of HTGRs. We have developed a roadmap towards licensing of commercial HTGR cogeneration systems. A test plan using the HTTR to support the establishment of safety standards and safety analysis methods are also presented. In addition, we confirmed that a vessel cooling system, a passive air-cooled decay heat removal system, satisfies the safety requirement.

Development of fabrication and inspection technologies for oxidation-resistant fuel element for high-temperature gas-cooled reactors

Aihara, Jun; Yasuda, Atsushi*; Ueta, Shohei; Ogawa, Hiroaki; Honda, Masaki*; Ohira, Koichi*; Tachibana, Yukio

Nippon Genshiryoku Gakkai Wabun Rombunshi, 18(4), p.237 - 245, 2019/12

https://doi.org/10.3327/taesj.J19.002

Development of fabrication and inspection technologies of oxidation resistant fuel element for improvement of safety of high temperature gas-cooled reactors (HTGRs) in severe oxidation accident was carried out. Simulated coated fuel particles (CFPs), alumina particles, were over-coated with mixed powder of Si, C and small amount of resin to form over-coated particles, and over-coated particles were molded and hot-pressed to sinter simulated oxidation resistant fuel elements with SiC/C mixed matrix. Simulated oxidation resistant fuel elements with matrix whose Si/C mole ratio is 1.00 were fabricated. Failure fraction of CFPs in fuel elements is one of very important inspection subjects of HTGR fuel. It is essential that CFPs are extracted from fuel elements without additional failure. Development of method for extraction of CFPs was carried out. Desolation of SiC by KOH method or pressurized acidolysis method should be applied to extraction of CFPs.

Reactor physics experiment in graphite moderation system for HTGR, 1

Fukaya, Yuji; Nakagawa, Shigeaki; Goto, Minoru; Ishitsuka, Etsuo; Kawakami, Satoru; Uesaka, Takahiro; Morita, Keisuke; Sano, Tadafumi*

KURNS Progress Report 2018, P. 148, 2019/08

https://www.rri.kyoto-u.ac.jp/PUB/report/PR/ProgRep2018/ProgRep2018.html

The Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) started the Research and Development (R&D) to improve nuclear prediction techniques for High Temperature Gas-cooled Reactors (HTGRs). The objectives are to introduce generalized bias factor method to avoid full mock-up experiment for the first commercial HTGR and to introduce reactor noise analysis to High Temperature Engineering Test Reactor (HTTR) experiment. To achieve the objectives, the reactor core of graphite moderation system named B7/4"G2/8"p8EUNU+3/8"p38EU(1) was newly composed in the B-rack of Kyoto University Critical Assembly (KUCA). The core plays a role of the reference core of the bias factor method, and the reactor noise was measured to develop the noise analysis scheme. In addition, training of operator of HTTR was also performed during the experiments.

Operation, test, research and development of the High Temperature Engineering Test Reactor (HTTR) (FY2017)

Department of HTTR

JAEA-Review 2019-006, 97 Pages, 2019/07

JAEA-Review-2019-006.pdf:10.18MB

The High Temperature Engineering Test Reactor (HTTR) was constructed to establish and upgrade basic technologies for HTGRs. In the fiscal year 2017 we continued activities for re-operation of the HTTR and have been inspected the application document for the HTTR licensing to prove conformity with the new regulatory requirements for research reactors taken effect since December 2013 had been applied. This report summarizes activities and results of HTTR operation, maintenance, international cooperation and so on which were carried out in the fiscal year 2017.

Development of highly efficient hydrogen production process by thermochemical method

Inagaki, Yoshiyuki

Suiso No Seizo, Yuso, Chozo Gijutsu To Zairyo Kaihatsu Jireishu, p.59 - 65, 2019/04

This report describes the outline of the thermochemical hydrogen production process by water splitting related to technologies on production, transport and storage of hydrogen. The report explains the principle of thermochemical process as well as the research and development status on Iodine-Sulfur (IS) process performed in JAEA. As energy for IS process, the outline and the domestic and abroad development status of a high temperature gas-cooled reactor is described.

Study of an HTGR and renewable energy hybrid system for grid stability

Sato, Hiroyuki; Yan, X. L.

Nuclear Engineering and Design, 343, p.178 - 186, 2019/03

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nucengdes.2019.01.010

A hybrid system combining HTGR and renewable energy is investigated to compensate intermittent renewable energy power generation. A new proposal of using the inventory and bypass control devices already built in the gas turbine, is found to be effective to compensate hourly to daily variation of renewable energy. The reactor thermal power remains at constant full power while the heat output is increased or decreased subject to the need of reactor power generation. On the other hand, the massive heat capacity in the graphite core is shown to be sufficient to compensate renewable energy on a time scale of seconds to minutes and up to about 20% of the rated power output of the nuclear plant. Similarly, no additional control devices are required to perform this control operation. These findings demonstrate the technical and economic potential of the HTGR system to maintain the stability of a grid being incorporated with significant portfolios of renewable energy power generation.

Uranium-based TRU multi-recycling with thermal neutron HTGR to reduce environmental burden and threat of nuclear proliferation

Fukaya, Yuji; Goto, Minoru; Ohashi, Hirofumi; Yan, X.; Nishihara, Tetsuo; Tsubata, Yasuhiro; Matsumura, Tatsuro

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 55(11), p.1275 - 1290, 2018/11

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2018.1492983

To reduce environmental burden and thread of nuclear proliferation, multi-recycling fuel cycle with High Temperature Gas-cooled Reactor (HTGR) has been investigated. Those problems are solved by incinerating TRans Uranium (TRU) nuclides, which is composed of plutonium and Minor Actinoide (MA), and there is concept to realize TRU incineration by multi-recycling with Fast Breeder Reactor (FBR). In this study, multi-recycling is realized even with thermal reactor by feeding fissile uranium from outside of the fuel cycle instead of breeding fissile nuclide. In this fuel cycle, recovered uranium by reprocessing and natural uranium are enriched and mixed with recovered TRU by reprocessing and partitioning to fabricate fresh fuels. The fuel cycle was designed for a Gas Turbine High Temperature Reactor (GTHTR300), whose thermal power is 600 MW, including conceptual design of uranium enrichment facility. Reprocessing is assumed as existing Plutonium Uranium Redox EXtraction (PUREX) with four-group partitioning technology. As a result, it was found that the TRU nuclides excluding neptunium can be recycled by the proposed cycle. The duration of potential toxicity decaying to natural uranium level can be reduced to approximately 300 years, and the footprint of repository for High Level Waste (HLW) can be reduced by 99.7% compared with GTHTR300 using existing reprocessing and disposal technology. Suppress plutonium is not generated from this cycle. Moreover, incineration of TRU from Light Water Reactor (LWR) cycle can be performed in this cycle.

Numerical evaluation on fluctuation absorption characteristics based on nuclear heat supply fluctuation test using HTTR

Takada, Shoji; Honda, Yuki*; Inaba, Yoshitomo; Sekita, Kenji; Nemoto, Takahiro; Tochio, Daisuke; Ishii, Toshiaki; Sato, Hiroyuki; Nakagawa, Shigeaki; Sawa, Kazuhiro*

Proceedings of 9th International Topical Meeting on High Temperature Reactor Technology (HTR 2018) (USB Flash Drive), 7 Pages, 2018/10

Nuclear heat utilization systems connected to HTGRs will be designed on the basis of non-nuclear grade standards for easy entry of chemical plant companies, requiring reactor operations to continue even if abnormal events occur in the systems. The inventory control is considered as one of candidate methods to control reactor power for load following operation for siting close to demand area, in which the primary gas pressure is varied while keeping the reactor inlet and outlet coolant temperatures constant. Numerical investigation was carried out based on the results of nuclear heat supply fluctuation tests using HTTR by non-nuclear heating operation to focus on the temperature transient of the reactor core bottom structure by imposing stepwise fluctuation on the reactor inlet temperature under different primary gas pressures below 120C. As a result, it was emerged that the fluctuation absorption characteristics are not deteriorated by lowering pressure. It was also emerged that the reactor outlet temperature did not reach the scram level by increasing the reactor inlet temperature 10 C stepwise at 80% of the rated power as same with the full power case.

RELAP5 modeling of the HTTR-GT/H secondary system and turbomachinery

Humrickhouse, P. W.*; Sato, Hiroyuki; Imai, Yoshiyuki; Sumita, Junya; Yan, X. L.

Proceedings of 9th International Topical Meeting on High Temperature Reactor Technology (HTR 2018) (USB Flash Drive), 9 Pages, 2018/10

This work describes the development of a RELAP5-3D model of the HTTR-GT/H plant secondary system. The RELAP5-3D model presently includes detailed models of several of the heat exchangers in the secondary system as well as the turbomachinery, which includes two compressors and two gas turbines connected to a common shaft and motor. The predictions of the model agreed well to design parameters in both sole power generation and hydrogen co-generation modes in most instances. Both the turbomachinery and heat exchanger models rely on extensive customization via RELAP5-3D control variables, and these implementations are outlined in detail. Potential improvements to the RELAP5-3D turbine model are discussed.