THERMAL-HYDRAULIC TESTS AND ANALYSES FOR THE APR1400'S DEVELOPMENT AND LICENSING

Abstract

The program on thermal-hydrulic evaluation by testing and analysis (THETA) for the development and licensing of the new design features in the APR1400 (Advanced Power reactor -1400) is briefly introduced with a presentation on the researcj motivation and typical results od the separte effect tests and analyses of the major design features. The fisrt part deals with multi-dimensional phenomena related to the safety injection (SI) water in a reactor pressure vessel downcomer that uses a direct vessel injection type of SI system. The other area is associated with the condensation of steam jets and the resultant thermal mixing in a water pool; these phenomena are relevant to the despressurization of a reactor coolant system (RCs). The second part describes our efforts to develop new components for safety enchancements, such as fludic device as a passive SI flow controller and a sparger to despressurize the RCS. This work contributes to an undestanfing of the new thermal-hydraulic phenomena that are relevant to advanced reactor system designs; it also improves the prediction capabilities of analysis tools for multi-dimensional flow behavior, especially in complicated geometries.