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Title: Use of Multiple Reheat Helium Brayton Cycles to Eliminate the Intermediate Heat Transfer Loop for Advanced Loop Type SFRs

Abstract

The sodium intermediate heat transfer loop is used in existing sodium cooled fast reactor (SFR) plant design as a necessary safety measure to separate the radioactive primary loop sodium from the water of the steam Rankine power cycle. However, the intermediate heat transfer loop significantly increases the SFR plant cost and decreases the plant reliability due to the relatively high possibility of sodium leakage. A previous study shows that helium Brayton cycles with multiple reheat and intercooling for SFRs with reactor outlet temperature in the range of 510°C to 650°C can achieve thermal efficiencies comparable to or higher than steam cycles or recently proposed supercritical CO2 cycles. Use of inert helium as the power conversion working fluid provides major advantages over steam or CO2 by removing the requirement for safety systems to prevent and mitigate the sodium-water or sodium-CO2 reactions. A helium Brayton cycle power conversion system therefore makes the elimination of the intermediate heat transfer loop possible. This paper presents a pre-conceptual design of multiple reheat helium Brayton cycle for an advanced loop type SFR. This design widely refers the new horizontal shaft distributed PBMR helium power conversion design features. For a loop type SFR with reactor outlet temperaturemore » 550°C, the design achieves 42.4% thermal efficiency with favorable power density comparing with high temperature gas cooled reactors.« less

Authors:
; ;
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
DOE - NE
OSTI Identifier:
957513
Report Number(s):
INL/CON-08-14932
TRN: US1000614
DOE Contract Number:  
DE-AC07-99ID-13727
Resource Type:
Conference
Resource Relation:
Conference: 2009 International Congress on Advances in Nuclear Power Plants (ICAPP),Shinjuku, Tokoy, Japan,05/10/2009,05/14/2009
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
22 GENERAL STUDIES OF NUCLEAR REACTORS; BRAYTON CYCLE; DESIGN; FAST REACTORS; GAS COOLED REACTORS; HEAT TRANSFER; HELIUM; NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS; POWER DENSITY; RELIABILITY; SAFETY; SODIUM; STEAM; THERMAL EFFICIENCY; WATER; WORKING FLUIDS; Multiple Reheat Helium Brayton Cycles

Citation Formats

Zhao, Haihua, Zhang, Hongbin, and Bays, Samuel E. Use of Multiple Reheat Helium Brayton Cycles to Eliminate the Intermediate Heat Transfer Loop for Advanced Loop Type SFRs. United States: N. p., 2009. Web.
Zhao, Haihua, Zhang, Hongbin, & Bays, Samuel E. Use of Multiple Reheat Helium Brayton Cycles to Eliminate the Intermediate Heat Transfer Loop for Advanced Loop Type SFRs. United States.
Zhao, Haihua, Zhang, Hongbin, and Bays, Samuel E. 2009. "Use of Multiple Reheat Helium Brayton Cycles to Eliminate the Intermediate Heat Transfer Loop for Advanced Loop Type SFRs". United States. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/957513.
@article{osti_957513,
title = {Use of Multiple Reheat Helium Brayton Cycles to Eliminate the Intermediate Heat Transfer Loop for Advanced Loop Type SFRs},
author = {Zhao, Haihua and Zhang, Hongbin and Bays, Samuel E},
abstractNote = {The sodium intermediate heat transfer loop is used in existing sodium cooled fast reactor (SFR) plant design as a necessary safety measure to separate the radioactive primary loop sodium from the water of the steam Rankine power cycle. However, the intermediate heat transfer loop significantly increases the SFR plant cost and decreases the plant reliability due to the relatively high possibility of sodium leakage. A previous study shows that helium Brayton cycles with multiple reheat and intercooling for SFRs with reactor outlet temperature in the range of 510°C to 650°C can achieve thermal efficiencies comparable to or higher than steam cycles or recently proposed supercritical CO2 cycles. Use of inert helium as the power conversion working fluid provides major advantages over steam or CO2 by removing the requirement for safety systems to prevent and mitigate the sodium-water or sodium-CO2 reactions. A helium Brayton cycle power conversion system therefore makes the elimination of the intermediate heat transfer loop possible. This paper presents a pre-conceptual design of multiple reheat helium Brayton cycle for an advanced loop type SFR. This design widely refers the new horizontal shaft distributed PBMR helium power conversion design features. For a loop type SFR with reactor outlet temperature 550°C, the design achieves 42.4% thermal efficiency with favorable power density comparing with high temperature gas cooled reactors.},
doi = {},
url = {https://www.osti.gov/biblio/957513}, journal = {},
number = ,
volume = ,
place = {United States},
year = {Fri May 01 00:00:00 EDT 2009},
month = {Fri May 01 00:00:00 EDT 2009}
}

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