Thermal-hydraulic simulation on cable-in-conduit-conductor for KSTAR superconducting magnets

In order to study the thermal-hydraulic behavior of the cable-in-conduit-conductor (CICC), a numerical model has been developed. In the model, the high heat transfer approximation between superconducting strands and supercritical helium is adopted. The strong coupling of heat transfer at the front of normal zone generates a contact discontinuity in temperature and density. In order to obtain the converged numerical solutions, a moving mesh method is used to capture the contact discontinuity in the short front region of the normal. The coupled equation is solved using the finite element method with the artificial viscosity term. Details of the numerical implementation are discussed. Comparing the results with GANDALF and QSAIT, the validation of the code is performed. The quench study of CICC for the KSTAR TF coils is also performed. (author)