A novel start-up procedure for natural-circulation boiling water reactors

Full text of publication follows: The elimination of recirculation pumps and associated systems, as proposed for natural-circulation Boiling Water Reactors (BWRs), allow a great simplification in the design of BWRs. On the other hand, it has been shown both experimentally and analytically that such a new reactor configuration makes the system susceptible to thermal-hydraulic instabilities during the start-up phase (so-called flashing-induced instabilities). Therefore, appropriate start-up procedures have to be planned to avoid instabilities in natural-circulation BWRs. Not many proposals of start-up procedures for natural-circulation BWRs are reported in literature, but all authors agree on the fact that the system should be pressurized before the transition to two-phase circulation is allowed. Nayak [1] and Jiang and coauthors [2] proposed to externally pressurize the system by injecting in the pressure vessel respectively steam produced in a separate boiler or nitrogen. Once the pressure in the reactor vessel is high enough, the reactor power can be increased to achieve two-phase natural circulation. Unfortunately, the procedure suggested by Nayak requires an external boiler of adequate volume and power and the related connecting piping to the reactor vessel, while the procedure suggested by Jiang and coauthors requires an additional system for the nitrogen storage and the related connecting piping to the reactor vessel. The external pressurization does not accomplish to the requirements of simplicity that are at the very base of natural circulation BWRs design and it is thus not recommendable. Cheung and Rao [3] suggested a start-up procedure in which the reactor is first filled with water at 80 deg. C at a pressure of 0.55 bar. The reactor is made critical and is pressurized in conditions of single-phase circulation up to a pressure of 63 bar. At this pressure a sudden transition to two-phase operation is achieved by opening the MSIVs (Main Steam Isolation Valves). In this case steam is generated due to flashing at high pressure. The simulation by means of TRACG shows that no flow oscillations occur during the transition from single- to two-phase operation. A similar start-up procedure is simulated by Cheng and coauthors [4] by means of the code RAMONA-4B. They find contradicting results compared to the one obtained by Cheung and Rao. However, RAMONA-4B cannot predict the occurrence of flashing at low pressures, since a single average system pressure is used by this code to calculate thermodynamic properties of water and steam in the system. Therefore, the results obtained by this code are meaningless with regard to the start-up of natural circulation two-phase systems. In the present work a novel start-up procedure will be illustrated which does not require any additional system and in which there is no necessity for an abrupt steam production at high pressure [5], as in the procedure of Cheung and Rao. In the procedure proposed in this work, the reactor vessel is pressurized by means of steam produced in the reactor vessel itself, but outside the core and riser section. In this way, the system can be pressurized while the reactor still operates in single-phase conditions, thus without occurrence of flashing-induced flow oscillations. At the same time, a smooth steam production and pressurization of the system is achieved. The feasibility of the intermediate state in which steam is produced in the reactor vessel while the circulation in core and riser sections remains single-phase has been already proved during an experimental campaign performed at the large-scale facility PANDA. The procedure is simulated by means of the ATHLET code, developed by GRS (Germany). This code has been successfully qualified against low-pressure flashing-induced instabilities within the framework of the EU project NACUSP. (authors)