• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.47 no.6
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• pp.700-711
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• 2015

Sodium-cooled fast breeder reactors use liquid sodium as a moderator and coolant to transfer heat from the reactor core. The main hazard associated with sodium is its rapid reaction with water. Sodium-water reaction (SWR) takes place when water or vapor leak into the sodium side through a crack on a heat-transfer tube in a steam generator. If the SWR continues for some time, the SWR will damage the surface of the defective area, causing it to enlarge. This self-enlargement of the crack is called "self-wastage phenomena." A stepwise numerical evaluation model of the self-wastage phenomena was devised using a computational code of multicomponent multiphase flow involving a sodium-water chemical reaction: sodiumwater reaction analysis physics of interdisciplinary multiphase flow (SERAPHIM). The temperature of gas mixture and the concentration of NaOH at the surface of the tube wall are obtained by a numerical calculation using SERAPHIM. Averaged thermophysical properties are used to assess the local wastage depth at the tube surface. By reflecting the wastage depth to the computational grid, the self-wastage phenomena are evaluated. A two-dimensional benchmark analysis of an SWAT (Sodium-Water reAction Test rig) experiment is carried out to evaluate the feasibility of the numerical model. Numerical results show that the geometry and scale of enlarged cracks show good agreement with the experimental result. Enlarged cracks appear to taper inward to a significantly smaller opening on the inside of the tube wall. The enlarged outer diameter of the crack is 4.72 mm, which shows good agreement with the experimental data (4.96 mm).

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2000.06a
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• pp.1829-1835
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• 2000

The experimental results of sodium-water reaction noise measurement in frequency range $1{/sim}200kHz$ are presented. The experiments of noise generation under the condition of sodium test facility, water leak rate $0.01{\sim}1.2g/s$ and temperature of sodium $250{\sim}500^{\circ}C$, were carried out. From theoretical study it is noted that the noise resonant attenuation on hydrogen bubbles in liquid sodium plays the significant role for leak noise spectra formation. Interaction of leak noise and hydrogen bubbles in sodium being accompanied by thermal, emission and viscosity energy dissipation was studied. Acoustic noise spectra were investigated from point of view of water leak detection in sodium/water steam generator. The results of sodium-water reaction noise absorption on hydrogen bubbles in liquid sodium by temperature $250{\sim}500^{\circ}C$ are presented. The theoretical model of noise absorption using the coefficients of attenuation was developed. From calculation the coefficients of attenuation were estimated.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.57 no.1
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• pp.28-41
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• 2019

We carried out performance analysis of Sodium-Water Reaction Pressure Relief System of Prototype Generation-IV Sodium-Cooled Fast Reactor. We analyzed transient-dynamic behavior of fluids inside the steam generator to vent into a sodium dump tank or a water dump tank when tubes in the steam generator were broken to cause a large-water-leak accident. Accordingly, we preliminarily evaluated design requirements of our system. Our results showed that sodium in the shell side of the steam generator and in Intermediate Heat Transport System was completely vented within 50 s and feed water in the tube side of the steam generator was completely vented within 2.5 s. It was analyzed that pressure of the tube side of the steam generator was higher than pressure of the shell side of the steam generator, which showed that sodium in the shell side did not flow into the tube side. Our results are expected to be used as basis information to performance analysis of Sodium-Water Reaction Pressure Relief System of Prototype Generation-IV Sodium-Cooled Fast Reactor.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.56 no.3
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• pp.893-899
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• 2024

In a secondary cooling system of a sodium-cooled fast reactor (SFR), rapid detection of hydrogen due to sodium-water reaction (SWR) caused by water leakage from a heat exchanger tube of a steam generator (SG) is important in terms of safety and property protection of the SFR. For hydrogen detection, the hydrogen detectors using atomic transmission phenomenon of hydrogen within Ni-membrane were used in Japanese proto-type SFR "Monju". However, during the plant operation, detection signals of water leakage were observed even in the situation without SWR concerning temperature up and down in the cooling system. For this reason, the study of a new hydrogen detector has been carried out to improve stability, accuracy and reliability. In this research, the authors focus on the difference in composition of hydrogen and the difference between the background hydrogen under normal plant operation and the one generated by SWR and theoretically estimate the hydrogen behavior in liquid sodium by using ultra-accelerated quantum chemical molecular dynamics (UA-QCMD). Based on the estimation, dissolved H or NaH, rather than molecular hydrogen (H₂), is the predominant form of the background hydrogen in liquid sodium in terms of energetical stability. On the other hand, it was found that hydrogen molecules produced by the sodium-water reaction can exist stably as a form of a fine bubble concerning some confinement mechanism such as a NaH layer on their surface. At the same time, we observed experimentally that the fine H₂ bubbles exist stably in the liquid sodium, longer than previously expected. This paper describes the comparison between the theoretical estimation and experimental results based on hydrogen form in sodium in the development of the new hydrogen detector in Japan.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.56 no.3
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• pp.388-403
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• 2018

We investigated design requirements of vent lines for Sodium-Water Reaction Pressure Relief System of Prototype Generation-IV Sodium-Cooled Fast Reactor. We developed design requirements of areas of the rupture disks of the steam generator, a diameter of the gas vent line of the sodium dump tank, a diameter of the gas vent line of the water dump tank, a diameter of the water dump line of the steam generator. With the design requirements, we calculated the time to vent fluid inside the steam generator and analyzed the transient pressure behavior, also evaluated the close pressure value of the isolation valve of the water dump line. Our results are expected to be used as basis information to design Sodium-Water Reaction Pressure Relief System of Prototype Generation IV Sodium-Cooled Fast Reactor.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.48 no.4
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• pp.952-964
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• 2016

The prototype generation IV sodium-cooled fast reactor (PGSFR) has been developed by the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute. This reactor uses sodium as a reactor coolant to transfer the core heat energy to the turbine. Sodium has chemical characteristics that allow it to violently react with materials such as a water or steam. When a sodium-water reaction (SWR) occurs due to leakage or breakage of steam generator tubes, high-pressure waves and corrosive reaction products are produced, which threaten the structural integrity of the components of the intermediate heat-transfer system (IHTS) and the safety of the primary heat-transfer system (PHTS). In the PGSFR, SWR events are included in the design-basis event. This event should be analyzed from the viewpoint of the integrities of the IHTS and fuel rods. To evaluate the integrity of the IHTS based on the consequences of the SWR, the behaviors of the generated high-pressure waves are analyzed at the major positions of a failed IHTS loop using a sodium-water advanced analysis method-II code. The integrity of the fuel rods must be consistently maintained below the safety acceptance criteria to avoid the consequences of the SWR. The integrity of the PHTS is evaluated using the multidimensional analysis of reactor safety-liquid metal reactor code to model the whole plant.

• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
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• v.45 no.12
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• pp.845-850
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• 2008

Hydrated sodium silicate was synthesized by hydrothermal reaction using anhydrous sodium silicate. The optimum additions of water was 25wt% to make hydrated sodium silicate with homogeneous and purposed water contents. Porous ceramics with homogeneous microstructure and spherical closed pore can be fabricated by elimination of the large pores(a few mm in size) which was formed during first heat treatment through the decomposition of water. Spherical closed pore was formed above $600^{\circ}C$ and the pore size was increased with increasing second heat treatment temperature due to growth of pores. The size of spherical closed pore was varied from 35 to $233\;{\mu}m$ and specific gravity was varied from 0.2 to 1.02 depending on the combinations of the first and second heat treatment temperature.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.48 no.2
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• pp.368-375
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• 2016

A sodiume-water reaction takes place when high-pressured water vapor leaks into sodium through a tiny defect on the surface of the heat transfer tube in a steam generator of the sodium-cooled fast reactor. The sodiume-water reaction brings deterioration of the mechanical strength of the heat transfer tube at the initial leakage site. As a result, it damages the crack itself, which may eventually enlarge into a larger opening. This self-enlargement is called "self-wastage phenomenon." In this study, a simulant experiment was proposed to reproduce the self-enlargement of a crack and to evaluate the mechanism of the self-wastage. The damage on the surface of the crack was simulated by making the neutralization reaction with hydrochloric acid solution and sodium hydroxide solution. A numerical investigation was carried out to validate the feasibility of the approach and to determine experimental conditions. From the computation results, it is observed that when 5M HCl is injected into 5M of NaOH with 0.05 m/s inlet velocity, the temperature at the surface near the crack increased over 319.26 K. The computational results show that the self-wastage phenomenon is capable of being reproduced by the simulant experiment.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.268-272
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• 1998

Water leak phenomena in the liquid sodium which is a coolant of liquid metal reactor, were investigated by carrying out sodium-water reaction experiment. It was confirmed that sodium and water react each other by the analysis of material composition of aspecimen at the end of experiment. When steam of $100kg/cm^2$ was passed through the leak path of the specimen for 4 hours, reaction products from sodium-water reaction were observed on the leak site. However, re-opening phenomena were not observed at this condition. It was interpretted that the reaction product precipitated on leak path and thermal transient caused self-plugging and re-openning phenomena, respectively.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.54 no.6
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• pp.2262-2275
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• 2022

The Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute (KAERI) studied the sodium-water reaction (SWR) minimized steam generator for the safety of the sodium-cooled fast reactor (SFR), and selected the copper bonded steam generator (CBSG) as the optimal concept. This paper introduces the conceptual design of the CBSG and the development of the CBSG sizing analyzer (CBSGSA). The CBSG consists of multiple heat transfer modules with a crossflow heat transfer configuration where sodium flows horizontally and water flows vertically. The heat transfer modules are stacked along a vertical direction to achieve the targeted large heat transfer capacity. The CBSGSA code was developed for the thermal-hydraulic analysis of the CBSG in a multi-pass crossflow heat transfer configuration. Finally, we conducted a preliminary sizing and rating analysis of the CBSG for the trans-uranium (TRU) core system using the CBSGSA code proposed by KAERI.