Evaluation Method for Core Thermohydraulics during Natural Circulation in Fast Reactors

Decay heat removal using natural circulation is one of significant functions for a reactor. As the decay heat removal system, a direct reactor auxiliary cooling system has been selected in current designs of fast reactors. In this system, cold sodium is provided in an upper plenum of reactor vessel and it covers the reactor core outlet. The cold sodium can penetrate into the gap region between the subassemblies. This gap flow is referred as inter-wrapper flow (IWF). A numerical estimation method for such phenomena was developed, which modeled each subassembly as a rectangular duct with gap region and also the upper plenum. This numerical simulation method was verified by a sodium test and also a water test. We applied this method to the natural circulation in a 600 MWe class fast reactor. The temperature in the core strongly depended on IWF, flow redistribution in the core, and inter-subassembly heat transfer.