Severe accident containment-response and source term analyses by AZORES code for a typical FBR plant

Japan Nuclear Energy Safety organization (JNES) is developing severe accident analysis codes in order to apply to the probabilistic safety assessment (PSA) for a typical fast breeder reactor (FBR). The AZORES code analyzes the severe accident phenomena in the reactor containment that reactor coolant (sodium) and molten core debris are released from the primary cooling system boundary and the release fraction to the environment of fission products (FP). This report summarized results analyzed using the AZORES code for a PLOHS (loss of decay heat removal function) accident sequence with the actual plant system about the containment bypass (CVBP) scenario, and the containment failure scenario due to hydrogen deflagration or detonation. The results showed that the coolant temperature of the primary system and the secondary system in the PLOHS sequence increased at the almost same temperature, and the creep damage to the reactor coolant boundary became significant when coolant temperature exceeded about 1,100 K. The release fractions of FP in the CVBP case were estimated to be 0.99 for Xe, 0.14 for iodine, 0.44 for Cs and 0.01 for non-volatile tetravalent Ce. The release fractions of FP in the containment vessel failure case due to hydrogen burning were estimated to be 0.82 for Xe, 0.06 for iodine, 0.06 for Cs and 0.003 for non-volatile tetravalent Ce. In the present study, release fractions of FPs to the environment were obtained for the CVBP and the containment failure cases of the PLOHS accident sequence for the typical FBR plant. (author)