Title: Comparison of steady and transient flow boiling critical heat flux for FeCrAl accident tolerant fuel cladding alloy, Zircaloy, and Inconel

Abstract

Steady and transient (with a heating rate of 685?/s) internal-flow CHF (Critical Heat Flux) experiments were conducted under atmospheric pressure at a fixed inlet temperature (40? or 60?) and mass flow (300kg/m²s) on Fe-13Cr-6Al alloy, Inconel 600 and Zircaloy-4 tube samples. Multiple experiments were repeated on the same specimen to investigate the effect of surface characteristic changes (i.e., roughness, wettability, and oxide scale morphology) on the occurrence of CHF. Despite notable changes of wettability, roughness, and oxide layer characteristics on samples that had already been subjected to CHF, measured flow CHF remained unchanged throughout repeated experiments for tested materials. This demonstrates that the surface effects on flow CHF are limited in the test conditions. In the steady-state flow boiling condition, Fe-13Cr-6Al alloy demonstrated a 22% and 14% increase in CHF compared to Zircaloy-4 and Inconel 600, respectively. Compared to the 2006 Groeneveld CHF lookup table, Fe-13Cr-6Al alloy gives a 13% increase in the tested flow boiling condition. Material properties are considered primarily responsible for the observed CHF differences among the tested materials. The surface thermal economy parameter $$\frac{(pc_p)^{3/2}}{\sqrt{k}}$$ is proposed as an explanation for the observed CHF differences; this parameter is related to material’s ability to avoid an irreversible dry spot formation. The apparent disagreement of Zircaloy-4 CHF with both the look up table predictions and Inconel 600 shows the limitation of departure of nuclate boiling (DNB) evaluations that do not consider cladding materials. The transient Fe-13Cr-6Al CHF is 39% and 23% higher than the lookup table prediction and the steady-state condition experimental result, respectively.

Authors:

Lee, Soon ^[1]; Liu, Maolong ^[2]; Brown, Nicholas ^[3]; Terrani, Kurt ^[4]; Blandford, Edward ^[1]; Ban, Heng ^[5]; Jensen, Colby B  ^[6];

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Lee, Youho ^[1]

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+ Show Author Affiliations

1. Univ. of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM (United States)
2. Shanghai Jiao Tong Univ. (China)
3. Pennsylvania State Univ., University Park, PA (United States)
4. Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
5. Univ. of Pittsburgh, PA (United States)
6. Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)

Publication Date:

Mon Apr 01 00:00:00 EDT 2019

Research Org.:

Idaho National Laboratory (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)

Sponsoring Org.:

USDOE Office of Nuclear Energy (NE)

OSTI Identifier:

1632324

Alternate Identifier(s):

OSTI ID: 1635964

Report Number(s):

INL/JOU-20-58370-Rev000
Journal ID: ISSN 0017-9310; TRN: US2201102

Grant/Contract Number:  

DE-AC07-05ID14517; 17-12688; NE-0008531

Resource Type:

Accepted Manuscript

Journal Name:

International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer

Additional Journal Information:

Journal Volume: 132; Journal Issue: C; Journal ID: ISSN 0017-9310

Publisher:

Elsevier

Country of Publication:

United States

Language:

English

Subject:

11 - NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS; accident tolerant fuel; critical heat flux; FeCrAl; Reactivity Initiated Accident; flow boiling