Simulation methodology for fuel assembly drop accident during handling

Conference · Fri Jul 01 00:00:00 EDT 2016

OSTI ID:22764105

Aleshin, Y. ^[1]; Cerracin, A. ^[2]; Park, N. G.; Yoo, Y. I. ^[3]

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1. Westinghouse Electric Company LLC, PWR Fuel Technology 5801 Bluff Road, Hopkins, SC 29061 (United States)
2. ENUSA Industrias Avanzadas S.A., Technology and Equipment Development C/Santiago Rusinol, 12, Madrid 28040 (Spain)
3. KEPCO Nuclear Fuel Corporation LTD, Research and Development Center, Nuclear Fuel Technology Department 242 Daedeok-daero 989 beon-gil, Daejeon, 305-353 (Korea, Republic of)

Fresh and irradiated fuel assembly handling is a routine part of Nuclear Power Plant activities. Fuel Assembly handling occurs during fresh fuel receipt, core refueling, spent fuel assemblies transfer from spent fuel pool to the storage containers, etc. Westinghouse, ENUSA and KEPCO-NF have collaborated in the technical area of Fuel Assembly Drop Accident (FADA) Simulation to update the approach for estimating the number of failed fuel rods as a consequence of a fresh or irradiated fuel assembly drop, which might occur during a handling accident in a PWR-type reactor. The proposed FADA simulation methodology starts with an assessment of fuel assembly impact velocity at the final stage of the drop in water or air. The vertical, horizontal or inclined drop directions are considered. This velocity is an input to determine a fuel assembly structural response during impact which defines the loading function for the fuel assembly components including spacer grids. The dynamic load on the fuel rod is calculated from the detailed spacer grid model and the corresponding loading function. Finally, the load from the spacer grid spring and dimples are applied to the fuel rod model to determine the cladding parameters for use in compliance to fuel rod cladding failure criteria. A combination of first principal, finite element analysis (FEA) and computational fluid dynamic (CFD) methods has been utilized to create a technically sound methodology. A number of specific and traditional tests for the fuel assembly and its components has been used to confirm that the proposed approaches which describe the physical phenomena related to the fuel assembly drop accident are reasonably conservative.

• Research Organization: American Nuclear Society - ANS, 555 North Kensington Avenue, La Grange Park, IL 60526 (United States)
• OSTI ID: 22764105
• Resource Relation: Conference: TOP FUEL 2016: LWR fuels with enhanced safety and performance, Boise, ID (United States), 11-15 Sep 2016; Other Information: Country of input: France; 4 refs.; Related Information: In: TOP FUEL 2016 Proceedings| 1670 p.
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS
42 ENGINEERING
CLADDING
COMPUTERIZED SIMULATION
F CODES
FAILURES
FINITE ELEMENT METHOD
FLUID MECHANICS
FUEL ASSEMBLIES
FUEL RODS
FUEL STORAGE POOLS
GRIDS
LOADING
NUCLEAR INDUSTRY
NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS
PWR TYPE REACTORS
REACTOR SIMULATORS
SPACERS
SPENT FUELS
VELOCITY