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Breaking ground on a new approach to construction
The drive to Kairos Power’s reactor demonstration site in Oak Ridge, Tenn., is not only scenic—it’s historic. Nearly 85 years ago, roughly 30,000 construction workers transformed orchards and farmland into a key Manhattan Project site. Depending on your route, you may pass by one of the three gatehouses that were once military checkpoints controlling access to Atomic Energy Commission production facilities.
Dobromir Panayotov
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 148 | Number 2 | October 2004 | Pages 247-255
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE04-A2455
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Westinghouse transient code POLCA-T brings together the system thermal-hydraulics plant models and three-dimensional (3-D) neutron kinetics core models. Participation in the OECD/NRC BWR Turbine Trip (TT) Benchmark is a part of our efforts toward the code's validation. The paper describes the objectives for TT analyses and gives a brief overview of the developed plant system input deck and 3-D core model.The results of exercise 1, system model without netronics, are presented. Sensitivity studies performed cover the maximal time step, turbine stop valve position and mass flow, feedwater temperature, and steam bypass mass flow. Results of exercise 2, 3-D core neutronic and thermal-hydraulic model with boundary conditions, are also presented. Sensitivity studies include the core inlet temperature, cladding properties, and direct heating to core coolant and bypass.The entire plant model was validated in the framework of the benchmark's phase 3. Sensitivity studies include the effect of SCRAM initialization and carry-under. The results obtained - transient fission power and its initial axial distribution and steam dome, core exit, lower and upper plenum, main steam line, and turbine inlet pressures - showed good agreement with measured data. Thus, the POLCA-T code capabilities for correct simulation of pressurizing transients with very fast power were proved.