Microstructure-Based Thermal Conductivity and Thermal Behavior Modeling of Nuclear Fuel UO₂-BeO

ABSTRACT

The development of ceramic-ceramic composite nuclear fuels benefits from thermal modeling by providing an understanding on how fabrication variables, such as phase fractions, densities, and geometry, will determine effective thermal conductivity. Finite element method (FEM) two and three dimensional programs were used to predict the thermal conductivity of composite UO₂-BeO materials. The FEM modeling results were compared to the measured UO₂-BeO fuel sample thermal conductivities. The comparison showed that the thermal modeling was in good agreement with the measured values. These benchmarking cases with the FEM thermal modeling method successfully demonstrated the potential of the models to accurately predict the effective thermal conductivity of an enhanced thermal conductivity oxide nuclear fuel. The FEM thermal modeling was used to predict UO₂-BeO nuclear fuel thermal conductivities with different BeO percentages, and then the reactor fuel thermal behavior was analyzed using the UO₂-BeO nuclear fuel thermal conductivities and other material properties. The analysis results show significant temperature decrease for the UO₂-BeO nuclear fuel compared to the traditional UO₂ fuel, and then the safety of the reactor would be improved.

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Notes on contributors

Wenzhong Zhou

Wenzhong Zhou is an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical and Biomedical Engineering at City University of Hong Kong. He received his B.S. (1996) and M.S. (2002) in heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) engineering from Tianjin University, China, and Ph.D. (2010) in nuclear engineering from Purdue University (USA). Before his current position, he worked as a research associate at Los Alamos National Laboratory. He is a member of the ANS, ASME, TMS, and Sigma Xi. His research interests are in multiphysics nuclear fuel performance modeling, multiphase flow and heat/mass transfer, nuclear thermal-hydraulics and reactor safety. He has published more than 70 technical papers in archival journals and conference proceedings. He serves as an associate editor for Journal of Power Technologies, Energy and Environment Research, and Mechanical Engineering Research.

Shripad T. Revankar

Shripad T. Revankar is a Professor of Nuclear Engineering and Director of the Multiphase and Fuel Cell Research Laboratory in the School of Nuclear Engineering at Purdue University (USA). He is also WCU Visiting Professor at Pohang University of Science and Technology in the Division of Advanced Nuclear Engineering in South Korea. He received his B.S. (1975), M.S. (1977), and Ph.D. (1983) in physics from Karnatak University, India, M.Eng. (1982) in Nuclear Engineering from McMaster University, Canada, and postdoctoral training at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory and at the Nuclear Engineering Department of University of California, Berkeley, from 1984 to 1987. His research interests are in the areas of nuclear reactor thermal hydraulics and safety, multiphase heat transfer, multiphase flow in porous media, instrumentation and measurement, fuel cell design, simulation and power systems, and nuclear hydrogen generation. He has published more than 250 technical papers in archival journals and conference proceedings. He is active member of the AIChE, ANS, AAAS, ECS, and ASEE. He is on the editorial board of several journals, including Heat Transfer Engineering. He is a fellow of the ASME and ANS.

Rong Liu

Rong Liu is a Ph.D. student at City University of Hong Kong. He received his B.S. in 2010 in physics from Jiangxi Normal University and M.S. in 2013 in materials science and engineering from South China University of Technology. He is currently working on fully coupled modeling and simulation for multiphysics nuclear fuels performance.

Mehrdad Shahmohammadi Beni

Mehrdad Shahmohammadi Beni is an undergraduate student at City University of Hong Kong. He is currently working on multiphysics modeling and simulation for nuclear fuels behavior and multiphase flow and heat transfer.