Development of neutronic-thermal hydraulic-mechanic-coupled platform for WCCB blanket design for CFETR

Abstract In the conceptual design phase of a fusion blanket, many factors significantly affect the blanket performance, such as material selection, radial layout, coolant channels, neutron wall loading, and heat flux from plasma. The blanket should achieve multiple objectives under any conditions, such as ensuring that the materials temperature is within the allowable range, and the temperature of the breeder is beyond the limit for tritium release; realizing tritium self-sustainability; assuring the ability of the shielding neutrons; and maintaining structural integrity. This indicates that blanket design is an iterative process for obtaining an optimal structure, which involves numerous variables and restricted conditions. Apparently, it would be a challenge to analyze it manually if there is no comprehensive tool encapsulating this process. This work aims to develop an integrated platform that couples neutronics, thermal hydraulics, and mechanics calculation, and many necessary variables are covered. By defining the structure dimensions, materials, and operation conditions on the GUI, it can automatically build the model, create the mesh, apply boundary conditions, process the result data, and transfer them between different types of software. Under the requirements of nuclear–thermal design, the optimal radial layout is initially obtained using the methodology of “predict + verify” with the iterative adjustment of feedback. Then, the 3D structure of a symmetric breeder unit is constructed based on this radial layout. The stiffening components and coolant channels are added for the thermal–mechanical analysis. Finally, optimization of the water cooled ceramic breeder (WCCB) blanket is performed to demonstrate the technical procedure and high working efficiency of this platform.

[1]  Songlin Liu,et al.  Thermo-mechanical analysis on the full module of water cooled ceramic breeder blanket for CFETR , 2018 .

[2]  Jean-Charles Jaboulay,et al.  Neutronic predesign tool for fusion power reactors system assessment , 2013 .

[3]  Xiaokang Zhang,et al.  Nuclear-thermal-coupled optimization code for the fusion breeding blanket conceptual design , 2016 .

[4]  Songlin Liu,et al.  Conceptual design of a water cooled breeder blanket for CFETR , 2014 .

[5]  Songlin Liu,et al.  Using one hybrid 3D-1D-3D approach for the conceptual design of WCCB blanket for CFETR , 2017 .

[6]  Alice Ying,et al.  Blanket/first wall challenges and required R&D on the pathway to DEMO , 2015 .

[7]  P. Titus,et al.  Conceptual design of the water cooled ceramic breeder blanket for CFETR based on pressurized water cooled reactor technology , 2017 .

[8]  Songlin Liu,et al.  Theoretical modeling of the effective thermal conductivity of the binary pebble beds for the CFETR-WCCB blanket , 2015 .

[9]  Ulrich Fischer,et al.  Integrated approach for fusion multi-physics coupled analyses based on hybrid CAD and mesh geometries , 2015 .

[10]  Qingwei Yang,et al.  Overview of the present progress and activities on the CFETR , 2017 .

[11]  Jia Li,et al.  The Development and Application of One Thermal–Hydraulic Program Based on ANSYS for Design of Ceramic Breeder Blanket of CFETR , 2015 .

[12]  G. Bongiovì,et al.  On the optimization of the first wall of the DEMO water-cooled lithium lead outboard breeding blanket equatorial module , 2016 .

[13]  Hiroyasu Utoh,et al.  Development of a two-dimensional nuclear-thermal-coupled analysis code for conceptual blanket design of fusion reactors , 2011 .

[14]  Michal Owsiak,et al.  Coupling between a multi-physics workflow engine and an optimization framework , 2016, Comput. Phys. Commun..

[15]  L. Terzolo,et al.  A Tool for Blanket Design and Nuclear Analysis Based on MCNP Code , 2010, IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science.

[16]  Jean-Charles Jaboulay,et al.  Development of the breeding blanket and shield model for the fusion power reactors system SYCOMORE , 2014 .