Investigation of decay heat removal systems in the ALLEGRO helium-cooled fast reactor

IF 1.9 3区工程技术 Q1 NUCLEAR SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

Nuclear Engineering and Design Pub Date : 2025-03-04 DOI:10.1016/j.nucengdes.2025.113952

Zsombor Bali , Gusztáv Mayer

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Abstract

ALLEGRO is a demonstrator reactor of the GFR2400 helium-cooled gas fast reactor selected for future research by the Generation IV International Forum (GIF) in the early 2000s. This 75 MW thermal power demonstrator reactor has been developed in several European projects over the past two decades. The current ALLEGRO design consists of pressurized water on the secondary side of both the main heat exchangers (MHX) and the decay heat removal systems (DHR). Nevertheless, in case of a primary-secondary break at the MHXs or the DHRs, the water coolant may ingress into the gas-cooled reactor core which may cause reactivity and corrosion issues. For this reason, replacing the secondary water in the MHXs and the DHRs is an important topic during the design phase of ALLEGRO. In this paper, the gases of helium, nitrogen and CO₂ are investigated as possible secondary coolants of the DHRs at different pressures using the CATHARE thermal hydraulics system code. The results show that from a cooling performance point of view, CO₂ gas is a promising candidate and by using this gas, a relatively small design change is needed concerning the size of the DHR heat exchangers.

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来源期刊

Nuclear Engineering and Design 工程技术-核科学技术

CiteScore

3.40

自引率

11.80%

发文量

377

审稿时长

5 months

期刊介绍： Nuclear Engineering and Design covers the wide range of disciplines involved in the engineering, design, safety and construction of nuclear fission reactors. The Editors welcome papers both on applied and innovative aspects and developments in nuclear science and technology. Fundamentals of Reactor Design include: • Thermal-Hydraulics and Core Physics • Safety Analysis, Risk Assessment (PSA) • Structural and Mechanical Engineering • Materials Science • Fuel Behavior and Design • Structural Plant Design • Engineering of Reactor Components • Experiments Aspects beyond fundamentals of Reactor Design covered: • Accident Mitigation Measures • Reactor Control Systems • Licensing Issues • Safeguard Engineering • Economy of Plants • Reprocessing / Waste Disposal • Applications of Nuclear Energy • Maintenance • Decommissioning Papers on new reactor ideas and developments (Generation IV reactors) such as inherently safe modular HTRs, High Performance LWRs/HWRs and LMFBs/GFR will be considered; Actinide Burners, Accelerator Driven Systems, Energy Amplifiers and other special designs of power and research reactors and their applications are also encouraged.