Validation study of computer code for sodium fire safety evaluation of fast reactor

A computer code solves coupled phenomena of thermal hydraulics and sodium fire based on a multi-zone model. It deals with an arbitrary number of rooms, each of which is connected mutually by doorways and penetrations. With regard to the combustion phenomena, a flame sheet model and a liquid droplet combustion model are used for pool and spray fires, respectively, with the chemical equilibrium model based on the Gibbs free energy minimization method. The chemical reaction and mass and heat transfer are solved interactively. A specific feature of is detailed representation of thermalhydraulics of a sodium pool and a steel liner, which is placed on the floor to prevent sodium–concrete contact. The authors analyzed a series of pool combustion experiments, in which gas and liner temperatures are measured in detail. It has been found that good agreement is obtained and the code has been validated with regard to pool combustion phenomena. Further research needs are identified for pool spreading modeling considering thermal deformation of steel liner and measurement of pool fluidity property as a mixture of liquid sodium and reaction products. The code is to be used mainly in the safety evaluation of the consequence of a sodium fire accident in a liquid metal cooled fast reactor as well as fire safety analysis in general.     

Response Surface Modeling of Aerosol Release Fraction in Sodium Pool Combustion

A response surface model has been proposed to evaluate an aerosol release fraction during sodium pool fire in a liquid metal fast reactor (LMFR). Air containing aerosols are radiative and they influence the allocation of combustion heat from the flame to atmospheric gas or sodium pool. Hence, the aerosol release fraction needs to be quantified based on the behavior of the aerosols and physics of mass and heat transfer. However, the aerosol release fraction is one of user-specified parameters of computer codes for the sodium fire safety analysis of the LMFR. In the present study, a response surface model of the aerosol release fraction has been developed based on numerical experiments of aerosol dynamics. For developing the model, aerosol dynamic equation has been solved coupled with thermal-hydraulics and chemical reaction. The authors obtained good agreement of the aerosol release fraction between the numerical experiments and the past experiments. Therefore, the aerosol behavior model has been validated with regard to the pool combustion phenomena and is reasonably applicable to the numerical experiment. Three influential variables on the release fraction are identified as pool temperature, gas temperature and oxygen molar fraction in the air. The proposed response surface model is a quadratic expression of the influential variables and can be easily employed in the sodium fire analysis code.     

A numerical study of radiation heat transfer in sodium pool combustion and response surface modeling of luminous flame emissivity

A response surface model of the luminous flame emissivity of sodium pool fire has been proposed for use in safety analysis computer codes of a liquid metal fast reactor. The liquid sodium burns in air resulting in not only heat generation but also release of sodium oxide aerosols of sub-micron diameters. Aerosols levitating in air are radiative and they influence the allocation of combustion heat from the flame to atmospheric gas or sodium pool. The emissivity of the flame needs to be quantified, as it is one of user-specified parameters of the computer codes for the sodium fire analysis. The response surface model of the flame emissivity is developed based on numerical experiments on the physics of mass and heat transfer and behavior of the aerosol. Thermal-hydraulic equations have been solved coupled with aerosol dynamics and chemical reaction. Three influential variables on the emissivity are identified as pool temperature, gas temperature and oxygen molar fraction in the air. It has been found that the emissivity is calculated reasonably as a function of the three variables. The proposed response surface model can be easily employed in the sodium fire analysis codes because it is a simple quadratic expression. For the safety evaluation of the sodium fire, combined use is recommended of the proposed model and the lumped-mass zone model code.     

钠冷快堆中池式钠火的计算分析

文章论述了根据池式钠火的特点建立了理论模型 ,编制了SPOOL程序。该程序模拟钠燃烧过程中钠和氧气的化学反应 ,钠燃烧热在各种介质中不同方式的传递 ,钠气溶胶的产生、沉积 ,以及在各种通风条件下多种介质的质量和能量交换等瞬态过程 ,描述了钠燃烧过程中各种特征参数随时间的变化。其主要的计算参数包括房间内气体的压力和温度、房间建筑结构的温度、钠气溶胶质量浓度等等。用俄罗斯别洛雅尔斯克核电站实验和法国卡桑德拉 3号实验的数据 ,对SPOOL程序进行验证的结果表明 ,该程序的计算结果可信。该程序为国内钠冷快堆中池式钠火事故的安全分析提供了分析方法     

池式钠火事故下燃烧产物气溶胶行为研究

在钠冷快堆的安全评估中,分析钠泄露导致的池式钠火事故下燃烧产物的气溶胶行为尤为重要。本文采用将池式钠火燃烧模型与气溶胶动力学模型耦合的方式,开发了池式钠火事故下燃烧产物气溶胶行为分析程序REBAC-SFR,基于该程序模拟了SAPFIRE-D1和ABCOVE池式钠火实验,并与实验数据进行了对比。结果表明,本文开发的程序具有良好的可靠性和正确性,可为钠工艺间内池式钠火事故下燃烧产物气溶胶行为分析研究提供理论工具。      

基于有限元分析法的钠火事故下钢覆面完整性分析

中国实验快堆钠工艺间的钢覆面结构是防止泄漏的钠与混凝土接触的重要屏障,其完整性直接关系到钠火事故下建筑结构的完整性和可靠性。本文以中国实验快堆309管廊间作为研究对象,梳理了可能破坏钢覆面结构完整性的各项因素,基于池式钠火分析软件的输出结果,在建立钢覆面破损二维瞬态模型的基础上,利用ANSYS热-结构耦合功能系统地分析了钢覆面的应力集中区的产生规律。研究表明,在发生超设计基准的钠泄漏钠火事故时,钢覆面上的漏钠燃烧持续30min后,其厚度从3 mm腐蚀至1.53mm,并在两块钢板的焊接部两端出现应力集中区,最大应力超过了材料的屈服强度,材料发生塑性变形,存在断裂的风险。本文的研究结果对后续快堆钢覆面结构的设计和安全评定方面具有一定的参考价值。     

Features of Dendritic Oxide during Sodium Combustion

Liquid sodium is used as the coolant in fast reactors (FRs). It is a superior thermal medium, but its chemical reactivity with oxygen and water is very high. After the Monju sodium leak accident, a better physical and chemical understanding of the reaction phenomena was required from the viewpoint of the public acceptance of FRs. The purpose of this study is to understand the oxidation behavior of liquid sodium in detail, because it plays an important role in the continuation of the combustion process. The liquid sodium surface is covered with a thin oxide layer at the start of combustion. Generally, the surface oxide layer on the solid metal prevents further oxidation; however, dendritic sodium oxide is generated, and it grows on the oxide layer. This means that sodium can be supplied to the interface of the reaction without being blocked by the reaction products. As a result, the reaction continues spontaneously. Therefore, reaction products such as dendritic oxide have a significant influence on the overall reaction behavior. However, the precise roles of such products on the reaction have not been clarified in previous research. Understanding the role of the dendritic oxide in the reaction can be helpful for controlling sodium combustion phenomena, for example, the extinction process. Therefore, this study is a useful contribution to ensuring FR safety.     

Numerical prediction of fire extinguishment characteristics of sodium leak collection tray in a fast breeder reactor

Sodium leak collection tray (LCT) is an efficient passive device used for the extinguishment of liquid sodium fire in case of an accidental leakage from the secondary circuit of a fast breeder reactor. The LCT essentially isolates the leaking sodium into closed containers where the resulting fire is extinguished due to limited availability of oxygen. The current work aims to highlight the combustion extinguishment characteristics of LCT through a lumped formulation by conserving the mass and energy of liquid sodium and constituent gases in various parts of the LCT. Here, the complex hydrodynamics of liquid sodium is emulated through a semi-analytical draining/sloshing model and its burning rates are predicted through a three-dimensional open pool combustion model for the tray region and a closed pool combustion model for the holdup vessel. These simulations evaluate the burning rates at discrete levels of liquid sodium which are subsequently interpolated to establish correlations involving instantaneous liquid levels and oxygen concentration. Using the correlations obtained from the draining and combustion models, the overall lumped formulation directly predicts the un-burnt sodium recoverable after the extinguishment of fire in the LCT. The predicted results of this model compare well with the available experimental data.     

基于FDS的钠火三维数值模拟研究

根据FDS火灾动力学分析软件的计算特点,结合钠火的燃烧模式,采用化学动力学建立了钠火燃烧的数值计算模型,将其与FDS软件相结合,使该软件具有模拟钠火燃烧的功能。使用两个钠火试验数据对程序计算得到的房间温度、压力、托盘内壁温度、氧气摩尔份额进行了验证。结果表明,房间温度、托盘内壁温度、氧气摩尔份额的计算结果与试验结果较为吻合,且计算结果也符合钠火实际燃烧的情况,但压力的计算结果与试验结果差异较大。     

Sodium Fire Code SFIRE1C for Pool Fire Characteristics

Sodium pool fire code, SOFIRE II, written for the constant value of stoichiometric combustion ratio and heat of reaction is used to compute the buildup of pressure and temperature in a containment. In the SOFIRE II model, for the formation of a mixture of Na₂O and Na₂O₂ in the sodium pool, the input stoichiometric combustion ratio and heat of formation values need to be varied to corresponding values admissible for the mixture. In the present work, the SOFIRE II one-cell model is revised and the present version SFIRE1C (Sodium FIRE 1 Cell model) accounts for the formation of Na₂O in an early stage of the fire and shifts to the formation of Na₂O₂ at a later stage. Thus SFIRE1C computes in a more realistic manner the reaction products which are formed in the pool. The model for sodium oxide aerosol release is also modified in this version, by incorporating a more appropriate aerosol release rate equation. The calculated values using the SFIRE1C one-cell model are compared with sodium pool fire experimental results.     

雾状钠火钠滴燃烧比率的模拟及应用

将雾状钠火中钠滴的燃烧分成预燃阶段和燃烧阶段,利用雾状钠火程序计算得到钠滴燃烧比率和时间的关系曲线,分别用幂函数、指数函数和线性函数对曲线进行拟合,拟合效果较好。拟合函数中包含钠滴下落时间和钠滴最大燃烧比率等参数,这些参数可通过钠滴下落燃烧试验或雾状钠火程序计算得到。通过推导得到了雾状钠火燃烧和单个钠滴燃烧的关系,钠滴燃烧比率的拟合函数被用来模拟雾状钠火燃烧的过程,包括用于计算已燃烧的钠质量、空气中未燃烧的钠质量、进入钠池的钠质量和雾状钠火的燃烧速率。当雾状钠火燃烧过程中钠泄漏流量恒定不变时,空气中未燃烧的钠质量和钠泄漏流量呈正比,雾状钠火的燃烧速率和钠泄漏流量呈正比。雾状钠火的燃烧速率和钠火造成的事故工艺间内的温度与压力变化直接相关。雾状钠火的燃烧速率被用来求解钠气溶胶的生成速率、钠燃烧火焰层和空气之间的传热、钠燃烧火焰层和墙壁之间的传热。总之,使用简单的函数模拟钠滴的燃烧比率曲线,将雾状钠火燃烧当成事故工艺间的热源和钠气溶胶源作为输入,便可模拟雾状钠火的整个燃烧过程,计算得到工艺间温度、压力和钠气溶胶浓度的变化。钠滴的燃烧比率曲线、雾状钠火的燃烧速率曲线还可与试验数据进行对比验证后作为雾状钠火模拟的输入,这种模拟方法可用于钠火事故安全分析中雾状钠火的模拟。     

Dynamics of liquid sodium pool spreading under sodium fire conditions

The spreading of burning liquid sodium has been investigated using a depth-averaged shallow water equation for isothermal and non-isothermal (burning) conditions. In the latter case, the spreading is one-way coupled with the flame through a separate energy equation for the pool, with appropriate source terms for radiative and conductive heat transfer from the flame, and a sink term (for the continuity equation) to account for loss due to burning. Pool fires on soil and concrete surface have been considered with appropriate friction and heat transfer terms in the momentum and energy equations, respectively. Using this model, numerical simulations have been carried out for a wide range of leak rates, and for a range of burning rates of liquid sodium. Results obtained from the non-isothermal model show that the non-isothermal effects of liquid sodium spreading can safely be neglected for the case or spreading of burning liquid sodium on a typical ground surface such as concrete or soil. Based on these conclusions, dimensionless correlations are proposed for the prediction of spreading parameters such as, equilibrium pool radius, pool formation time, and for mass inventory under pool fire conditions for liquid sodium. These parameters which are obtained from the spreading code can be specified, as input parameters for the existing sodium fire safety codes.     

钠冷快堆混合钠火程序开发

钠管道泄漏继而发生钠的燃烧为钠冷快堆特有的事故。在喷雾钠火模型和池式钠火模型基础上,将钠喷雾燃烧和池式燃烧进行了耦合,并针对钠冷快堆钠工艺间的结构特点,最终开发了混合钠火计算程序COMSFIRE。使用该程序计算了FAUNA喷雾钠火试验和CADARACHE池式钠火试验,并与试验结果和部分程序计算结果进行了对比。同时设计了混合燃烧算例,并使用该程序与CONTAIN-LMR程序进行了对比。通过计算结果的对比和分析,初步验证了程序的正确性。     

用于池式快堆系统分析的钠池三维模型开发

由于池式快堆钠池内的热工水力学特性对反应堆的安全运行有重要影响,本文采用基于交错网格的SIMPLE算法开发直角坐标系和柱坐标系下钠池三维计算软件。应用CFX软件进行验证之后,完成了三维流场分析程序与系统分析软件SAC-CFR的耦合,并用耦合后的程序分析日本文殊快堆45%功率稳态运行工况上腔室内的流场分布,初步验证了堆芯上腔三维化的SAC-CFR用于系统分析的有效性,为进一步开发事故模型、非能动余热排出系统模型做准备。     

Development of Sodium-cooled Fast Reactor Sodium Combined Fire Code

Sodium fire caused by sodium pipe leakage is the specific accident for sodium-cooled fast reactor. Based on the sodium spray fire model and sodium pool fire model, sodium spray fire and sodium pool fire were coupled together. A sodium combined fire code COMSFIRE was finally developed based on the structure characteristic of sodium technology room in sodium-cooled fast reactor. FAUNA sodium spray fire experiment and CADARACHE sodium pool fire experiment were calculated with the developed COMSFIRE code, the results of which were compared with the experiments results and some other code results. A combined fire case was designed, and the results were compared with CONTAIN-LMR code. The correctness of the COMSFIRE code was primarily proved through the comparison and analysis.     

Sodium pool combustion phenomena under natural convection airflow

Sodium pool fire is a design basis accident of sodium-cooled fast reactor. In this study, a numerical method for multi-dimensional modeling of sodium pool fire has been developed. It considers coupling of thermal-hydraulics, chemical reaction and aerosol dynamics equations. From the present multi-dimensional computation, phenomena of sodium pool fire are understood such as flow and temperature fields and aerosol mass distribution of various sizes. It has been found that the burning rate varies along the radial direction and the mass and heat transfer around the pool peripheral is maximum and most influential. The thermal-hydraulic phenomena in the near-surface region are very important to determine the sodium pool fire consequence such as the burning rate and aerosol emission. The area-averaged burning rate and aerosol release fraction calculated by the present numerical method are in agreement with experimental data.     

Experimental study on combustion characteristics of sodium fire in a columnar flow

In the operation of the sodium-cooled fast reactor, the accident caused by the leakage and combustion of liquid sodium is common and frequent in sodium-related facilities. This paper is based on an experimental study of sodium fire in a columnar flow, which was carried out to focus on the burning characteristics by analyzing the temperature fields in the burner. The injection of 200 °C liquid sodium with the flux of 0.5 m³/h was poured into a 7.9 m³ volume stainless steel cylindrical burner to shape a sodium fire, and the data of temperature fields in the burner have been collected by dozens of thermocouples which are laid in the combustion space and sodium collection plate. These results show that the sodium fire in a columnar flow is composed of the foregoing centered columnar fire, the subsequent spray fire caused by atomization and the pool fire on the collection plate. The temperature close to the burning sodium flow maximally reaches up to 950 °C. The radial temperatures apart from the sodium flow are relatively low and generally about 200 °C, and maximally just 300 °C even when close to the sodium collection plate. The maximum temperature of the burning sodium dropping on the collection plate rises in the center of plate, about 528 °C. This study is helpful to evaluate the combustion characteristics, formation process and composing forms of the sodium fire in the sodium-related facilities.     

Experimental study on combustion and suppression characteristics of sodium fire in a columnar flow using extinguishing powder

In the operation of the sodium-cooled fast reactor, the leakage and fire accident of liquid sodium is common and it is frequent in sodium-related facilities. This study focuses on the combustion and suppression characteristics of sodium fire in a columnar flow. Liquid sodium (250 °C) is injected into a 7.9 m³ cylindrical chamber at a flow rate of about 1.0 m³/h to create a columnar sodium fire, and 18.4 kg class D extinguishing powder is sprayed after the liquid sodium injection. The temperature in the chamber space and sodium collection plate and the heat release rate from sodium fire are measured and analyzed. Based on the temperature data the sodium fire under suppression could be divided into four phases of dropping sharply, continuously remaining lower, rising and declining mildly, and depressing. The sodium fire in the space could be suppressed and cooled down if the extinguishing agent could spray in the early period of the liquid sodium injection. The extinguishing agent could suppress the combustion and spreading of liquid sodium dropping on the collection plate, limit the pool combustion area and postpone the commencement of sodium pool burning in spite of its later re-ignition happening. This study promises to evaluate the combustion and suppression characteristics of sodium fire in the sodium-related facilities.     

Numerical investigation of multi-dimensional characteristics in sodium combustion

Multi-dimensional sodium combustion behavior has been numerically investigated in the present paper. A new computer code AQUA-SF has been developed for this purpose. The code includes two sodium combustion models (so called ‘spray combustion’ and ‘pool combustion’), a mass and heat transfer model considering a six-flux gas radiation and a coagulation and sedimentation model of sodium oxide and hydroxide aerosols. The sodium spray combustion rate is evaluated by a summation of the combustion rate of each sodium droplet with an individual diameter. A flame sheet model is applied to situations where sodium spreads out on the floor and a pool combustion takes place. The model assumes an infinitely thin flame above the pool surface and is based on a mass and energy balance in the flame. As the results of numerical analyses of a sodium spray combustion test, a location of high-temperature core region and a maximum temperature agrees with the experiment. Good agreements of an overall transient behavior are obtained in a large-scale sodium combustion test analysis. The numerical analyses also demonstrate that the distributions of temperature and chemical species concentration vary with sodium combustion modes. If sodium scatters and the spray combustion is dominant, the distributions vary in space. When a large amount of sodium exists on a floor and the pool area is enlarged, the distributions are more uniform in space.     

钠冷快堆中喷雾钠火的计算分析

根据钠冷快堆中喷雾钠火的特点建立了理论模型，编制了SSPRAY程序。该程序模拟钠喷雾燃料过程中钠滴的运动、钠和氧气的燃烧反应、热量传递和质量传递等瞬态过程。用该程序计算了气体和墙壁温度、气体压力、氧气摩尔份额、喷雾流燃烧速率和热量热递速率等主要参数。利用AI实验数据和美国SPRAY－3A的计算结果对程序进行了验证，结果符合较好。