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Nuclear Criticality Safety
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2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
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Can hydrogen be the transportation fuel in an otherwise nuclear economy?
Let’s face it: The global economy should be powered primarily by nuclear power. And it probably will by the end of this century, with a still-significant assist from renewables and hydro. Once nuclear systems are dominant, the costs come down to where gas is now; and when carbon emissions are reduced to a small portion of their present state, it will become obvious that most other sources are only good in niche settings. I mean, why use small modular reactors to load-follow when they can just produce that power instead of buffering it?
Minoru Yamada, Ikuo Kinoshita, Toshihide Torige, Michio Murase, Yoshitaka Yoshida, Hideo Nakamura
Nuclear Technology | Volume 200 | Number 2 | November 2017 | Pages 125-143
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2017.1362940
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Application of the statistical safety evaluation method to the analysis for reflux cooling in the loss of residual heat removal system (RHR) event during mid-loop operation was conducted with RELAP5/MOD3.2 as the best-estimate code. The evaluation parameters for this event are the reactor coolant system (RCS) pressure and reactor vessel (RV) water level. A phenomena identification and ranking table was developed previously to identify important phenomena that have a large influence on the evaluation parameters. The uncertainties of the analytical models which are related to the important phenomena were quantified to use as input for the statistical analysis. Actual plant sensitivity analyses were carried out to confirm the influence of the uncertainty which was quantified. Validation analysis of the RELAP5/MOD3.2 code was carried out for the reflux cooling test conducted with the ROSA-IV Large-Scale Test Facility to confirm that the experimental RCS pressure results were within the range of the uncertainty of the analytical models. A statistical analysis for 93 cases was carried out for a four-loop plant to evaluate the RV water level in the steady state and the maximum RCS pressure with 95% cumulative probability and 95% confidence. As a result, it was confirmed that reflux cooling using two cooling steam generators was successful.