• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 2005.07a
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• pp.223-225
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• 2005

This paper will be introduce a new paradigm and prospects for energy supply system in near future which produces electric and district heat cogeneration with dispersed power grid with small nuclear power units. Recently, in nuclear field, a lot of effort has been done in nuclear major countries to develop small and medium reactor for enhancement of nuclear peaceful use as like in district heating, electric power generation, seawater desalination or hydrogen generation. This paper presents a new way and prospects for power source in distribution system by using the distributed & remote cogeneration system using small reactor.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.47 no.2
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• pp.148-156
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• 2015

Several vendors have recently been actively pursuing the development of integral pressurized water reactors (iPWRs) that range in power levels from small to large reactors. Integral reactors have the features of minimum vessel penetrations, passive heat removal after reactor shutdown, and modular construction that allow fast plant integration and a secure fuel cycle. The features of an integral reactor limit the options for placing control and safety system instruments. The development of instrumentation and control (I&C) strategies for a large 1,000 MWe iPWR is described. Reactor system modeling-which includes reactor core dynamics, primary heat exchanger, and the steam flashing drum-is an important part of I&C development and validation, and thereby consolidates the overall implementation for a large iPWR. The results of simulation models, control development, and instrumentation features illustrate the systematic approach that is applicable to integral light water reactors.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 2005.07a
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• pp.420-422
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• 2005

This paper introduces a new paradigm for energy supply system in near future which produces electric and district heat cogeneration with dispersed power grid with small nuclear power units. Recently, in nuclear field, a lot of effort has been done in nuclear major countries to develop small and medium reactor for enhancement of nuclear peaceful use as like in district heating, electric power generation, seawater desalination or hydrogen generation.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.52 no.1
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• pp.19-26
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• 2020

Small nuclear reactor features higher power capacity, longer operation life than conventional power sources. It could be an ideal alternative of existing power source applied for special equipment for terrestrial or underwater missions. In this paper, a 25kWe heat pipe cooled reactor power source applied for multiple use is preliminary designed. Based on the design, a thermal-hydraulic analysis code for heat pipe cooled reactor is developed to analyze steady and transient performance of the designed nuclear reactor. For reactor design, UN fuel with 65% enrichment and potassium heat pipes are adopted in the reactor core. Tungsten and LiH are adopted as radiation shield on both sides of the reactor core. The reactor is controlled by 6 control drums with B₄C neutron absorbers. Thermoelectric generator (TEG) converts fission heat into electricity. Cooling water removes waste heat out of the reactor. The thermal-hydraulic characteristics of heat pipes are simulated using thermal resistance network method. Thermal parameters of steady and transient conditions, such as the temperature distribution of every key components are obtained. Then the postulated reactor accidents for heat pipe cooled reactor, including power variation, single heat pipe failure and cooling channel blockage, are analyzed and evaluated. Results show that all the designed parameters satisfy the safety requirements. This work could provide reference to the design and application of the heat pipe cooled nuclear power source.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.54 no.7
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• pp.2435-2443
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• 2022

The once-through steam generator used in the small modular reactor needs to consider the stability of the outlet steam pressure and steam superheat of the secondary circuit to achieve better operating efficiency. For this reason, this paper designs a controllable operation scheme for the steam pressure and superheat of the small reactor once-through steam generator. On this basis, designs a variable universe fuzzy controller, first, design the fuzzy control rules to make the controller adjust the PI controller parameters according to the change of the error; secondly, use the domain adjustment factor to further subdivide the input and output domain of the fuzzy controller according to the change of the error, to improve the system control performance. The simulation results show that the operation scheme proposed in this paper have better system performance than the original scheme of the small reactor system, and controller proposed in this paper have better control performance than traditional PI controller and fuzzy PI controller, what's more, the designed control system also showed better anti-disturbance performance in lifting experiment between 100% and 80% working conditions. Finally, the experimental platform formed by connecting the digital small reactor with Matlab/Simulink through OPC(OLE for Process Control) communication technology also verified the feasibility of the proposed scheme.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.311-318
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• 2011

Small-scale reactors have recently attracted attention as a potential power generation source for the future. The Regional Energy Research Institute for Next Generation is currently developing a small-scale reactor called Regional Energy rX 10 MVA (REX-10). The current paper deals with a power system to be used with small-scale reactors for multi-purpose regional energy systems. This small nuclear system can supply electric and thermal energy like a co-generation system. The electrical model of the REX-10 has been developed as a part of the SCADA system. REX-10's dynamic and electromagnetic performance on the power system is analyzed. Simulations are carried out on a test system based on Ulleung Island's power system to validate REX-10 availability on a power system. RSCAD/RTDS and PSS/E software tools are used for the simulation.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.48 no.6
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• pp.1303-1314
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• 2016

This work examines the most viable nuclear technology options for future underwater designs that would meet high safety standards as well as good economic potential, for construction in the 2030-2040 timeframe. The top five concepts selected from a survey of 13 nuclear technologies were compared to a small modular pressurized water reactor (PWR) designed with a conventional layout. In order of smallest to largest primary system size where the reactor and all safety systems are contained, the top five designs were: (1) a lead-bismuth fast reactor based on the Russian SVBR-100; (2) a novel organic cooled reactor; (3) an innovative superheated water reactor; (4) a boiling water reactor based on Toshiba's LSBWR; and (5) an integral PWR featuring compact steam generators. A similar study on potential attractive power cycles was also performed. A condensing and recompression supercritical $CO_2$ cycle and a compact steam Rankine cycle were designed. It was found that the hull size required by the reactor, safety systems and power cycle can be significantly reduced (50-80%) with the top five designs compared to the conventional PWR. Based on the qualitative economic consideration, the organic cooled reactor and boiling water reactor designs are expected to be the most cost effective options.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.43 no.4
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• pp.154-159
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• 2018

Background: To prevent small leakage accidents, a real-time and direct detection system for small leaks with a detection limit below that of existing systems, e.g. $0.5gpm{\cdot}hr^{-1}$, is required. In this study, a small-size beta detector, which can be installed inside the reactor containment (CT) building and detect small leaks directly, was suggested and its feasibility was evaluated using MCNPX simulation. Materials and Methods: A target nuclide was selected through analysis of radiation from radionuclides in the reactor coolant system (RCS) and the spectrum was obtained via a silicon detector simulated in MCNPX. A window was designed to reduce the background signal caused by other nuclides. The sensitivity of the detector was also estimated, and its shielding designed for installation inside the reactor CT. Results and Discussion: The beta and gamma spectrum of the silicon detector showed a negligible gamma signal but it also contained an undesired peak at 0.22 MeV due to other nuclides, not the $^{16}N$ target nuclide. Window to remove the peak was derived as 0.4 mm for beryllium. The sensitivity of silicon beta detector with a beryllium window of 1.7 mm thickness was derived as $5.172{\times}10^{-6}{\mu}Ci{\cdot}cc^{-1}$. In addition, the specification of the shielding was evaluated through simulations, and the results showed that the integrity of the silicon detector can be maintained with lead shielding of 3 cm (<15 kg). This is a very small amount compared to the specifications of the lead shielding (600 kg) required for installation of $^{16}N$ gamma detector in inside reactor CT, it was determined that beta detector would have a distinct advantage in terms of miniaturization. Conclusion: The feasibility of the beta detector was evaluated for installation inside the reactor CT to detect small leaks below $0.5gpm{\cdot}hr^{-1}$. In future, the design will be optimized on specific data.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.53 no.11
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• pp.3580-3596
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• 2021

An integral test facility, PILLAR, was commissioned, aiming to provide valuable experimental results which can be referenced by system and component designers and used for the performance demonstration of liquid-metal-cooled, passive small modular reactors (SMRs) toward their licensing. The setup was conceptualized by a scaling analysis which allows the vertical arrangements to be conserved from its prototypic reactor, scaled uniformly in the radial direction achieving a flow area reduction of 1/200. Its final design includes several heater rods which simulate the reactor core, and a single heat exchanger representing the steam generators in the prototype. The system behaviors were characterized by its data acquisition system implementing various instruments. In this paper, we present not only a detailed description of the facility components, but also selected experimental results of both steady-state and transient cases. The obtained steady-state test results were utilized for the benchmark of a system code, achieving a capability of accurate simulations with ±3% of maximum deviations. It was followed by qualitative comparisons on the transient test results which indicate that the integral system behaviors in passive LBE-cooled systems are able to be predicted by the code.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.54 no.3
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• pp.803-810
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• 2022

The small modular liquid-metal fast reactor (SMFR) is an important component of advanced nuclear systems. SMFRs exhibit relatively low breeding capability and constraint space for control rod installation. Consequently, control rods are deeply inserted at beginning and are withdrawn gradually to compensate for large burnup reactivity loss in a long lifetime. This paper is committed to investigating the impact of control rod compensation operation on core neutronics characteristics. This paper presents a whole core fine depletion model of long lifetime SMFR using OpenMC and the influence of depletion chains is verified. Three control rod position schemes to simulate the compensation process are compared. The results show that the fine simulation of the control rod compensation process impacts significantly the fuel burnup distribution and absorber consumption. A control rod equivalent position scheme proposed in this work is an optimal option in the trade-off between computation time and accuracy. The control position is crucial for accurate power distribution and void feedback coefficients in SMFRs. The results in this paper also show that the pin level power distribution is important due to the heterogeneous distribution in SMFRs. The fuel burnup distribution at the end of core life impacts the worth of control rods.