Abstract
Accelerator transmutation of waste (ATW) is a new concept that would destroy actinides in spent fuel and produce electrical power. This study explores the possibility of modeling the thermo-hydraulics of this system with computational fluid dynamics (CFD). The benchmark for the model comparison is an experiment conducted by the Institute of Physics and Power Engineering on one particular ATW system concept. The experimenters used thermocouples to determine the temperature profile and boundary conditions, which provided the boundary conditions for the computer model. CFX-5.5 is the commercial CFD code that modeled the thermo-hydraulics of the experiment. The computational model results show that the calculated temperature profile reasonably agrees with the temperature profile of the experiment, especially in the low flow regions. However, predictions are not as close in critical areas of the experiment. The temperature gradient is higher in the experiment than in the computational model close to the heat source. This may be a result of false diffusion, which tends to smooth the gradient. Despite this shortcoming, the results of the calculations indicate that CFX-5.5 is an effective tool for modeling the thermo-hydraulics of an accelerator transmutation of waste system.
Pratt, Preston Persley (2003). A three dimensional simulation of a thermal experiment conducted on an accelerator driven system target model concept. Master's thesis, Texas A&M University. Available electronically from
https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /ETD -TAMU -2003 -THESIS -P74.