The goal of this project is to provide experimental data relevant for hydraulic and ignition phenomena of prototypic water reactor fuel assemblies. The intended scope of work was defined in an experts’ meeting organised by the OECD/NEA.A highly detailed thermal-hydraulic characterisation will be performed of full-length, commercial fuel assembly mock-ups to provide data for the direct validation of severe accident codes. Code predictions based on previous results indicate that fuel assemblies can ignite and radially propagate in a complete loss-of-coolant accident. Hence, there is a need for qualified data obtained in representative fuel configurations. The proposed experiments will focus on thermal-hydraulic and ignition phenomena in pressurised water reactor (PWR) 17x17 assemblies and will supplement earlier results obtained for boiling water reactor (BWR) assemblies, which will be made available to the SFP. It is believed that code validations based on both the PWR and BWR experimental results will considerably enhance the code applicability to other fuel assembly designs and configurations.
The project is scheduled to run for three years and will be conducted in two phases:
Czech Republic, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Japan, Norway, Republic of Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States.
July 2009 – February 2013
USD 5.2 million.
Radomir Rehacek
Last reviewed: 13 December 2011