New approach to evaluate axial deformation of PWR fuel assembly on criticality safety of transport packages under impact accidents

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

Annals of Nuclear Energy Pub Date : 2025-05-26 DOI:10.1016/j.anucene.2025.111558

Xinling Dai , Yanmin Zhang , Junxiang Xu , Dechang Cai , Jin Cai

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

In accordance with pertinent regulations, Pressurized Water Reactor (PWR) fuel assemblies transport packages must maintain subcriticality across all transport scenarios, including those involving accidents. Accidents can induce buckling in fuel rods, thereby altering the local pin pitch. An expanded pitch can adversely affect criticality safety; hence, it is customary to presume maximum lattice expansion across the entire active zone to anticipate the worst potential accidents. However, mechanical analysis reveal that lattice expansion is confined to the impact end. Consequently, the original evaluative model overestimated

k_{e f f}

without necessity. This study refines the evaluative model for PWR fuel assemblies under transportation accidents by concerning axial deformation, thereby releasing the safety margin. The refined model can be seamlessly integrated with non-uniform arrangement of fuel rods. These advantages make it more suitable as an envelope model for criticality safety analysis of fuel transport packages.

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冲击事故下压水堆燃料组件轴向变形对运输包件临界安全评价的新方法

根据相关法规，压水堆（PWR）燃料组件运输包必须在所有运输场景中保持亚临界状态，包括涉及事故的运输场景。事故会引起燃料棒的屈曲，从而改变局部销距。膨胀节距会对临界安全产生不利影响；因此，通常假定整个活动区域的晶格扩展最大，以预测最坏的潜在事故。然而，力学分析表明，晶格膨胀仅限于冲击端。因此，原来的评价模型不必要地高估了keff。本研究通过考虑轴向变形，完善了压水堆燃料组件在运输事故下的评价模型，从而释放了安全裕度。改进后的模型可以与燃料棒的非均匀排列无缝集成。这些优点使其更适合作为燃料运输包件临界安全分析的包络模型。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Annals of Nuclear Energy 工程技术-核科学技术

CiteScore

4.30

自引率

21.10%

发文量

632

审稿时长

7.3 months

期刊介绍： Annals of Nuclear Energy provides an international medium for the communication of original research, ideas and developments in all areas of the field of nuclear energy science and technology. Its scope embraces nuclear fuel reserves, fuel cycles and cost, materials, processing, system and component technology (fission only), design and optimization, direct conversion of nuclear energy sources, environmental control, reactor physics, heat transfer and fluid dynamics, structural analysis, fuel management, future developments, nuclear fuel and safety, nuclear aerosol, neutron physics, computer technology (both software and hardware), risk assessment, radioactive waste disposal and reactor thermal hydraulics. Papers submitted to Annals need to demonstrate a clear link to nuclear power generation/nuclear engineering. Papers which deal with pure nuclear physics, pure health physics, imaging, or attenuation and shielding properties of concretes and various geological materials are not within the scope of the journal. Also, papers that deal with policy or economics are not within the scope of the journal.