• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.55 no.5
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• pp.1802-1813
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• 2023

Conjugate heat transfer between liquid metal and solid is a common phenomenon in a liquid-metal-cooled fast reactor's fuel assembly and heat exchanger, dramatically affecting the reactor's safety and economy. Therefore, comprehensively studying the sophisticated conjugate heat transfer in a liquid-metal-cooled fast reactor is profound. However, it has been evidenced that the traditional Simple Gradient Diffusion Hypothesis (SGDH), assuming a constant turbulent Prandtl number (Pr_t,, usually 0.85 - 1.0), is inappropriate in the Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations of liquid metal. In recent decades, numerous studies have been performed on the four-equation model, which is expected to improve the precision of liquid metal's CFD simulations but has not been introduced into the conjugate heat transfer calculation between liquid metal and solid. Consequently, a four-equation model, consisting of the Abe k - ε turbulence model and the Manservisi k_𝜃 - ε_𝜃 heat transfer model, is applied to study the conjugate heat transfer concerning liquid metal in the present work. To verify the numerical validity of the four-equation model used in the conjugate heat transfer simulations, we reproduce Johnson's experiments of the liquid lead-bismuth-cooled turbulent pipe flow using the four-equation model and the traditional SGDH model. The simulation results obtained with different models are compared with the available experimental data, revealing that the relative errors of the local Nusselt number and mean heat transfer coefficient obtained with the four-equation model are considerably reduced compared with the SGDH model. Then, the thermal-hydraulic characteristics of liquid metal turbulent pipe flow obtained with the four-equation model are analyzed. Moreover, the impact of the turbulence model used in the four-equation model on overall simulation performance is investigated. At last, the effectiveness of the four-equation model in the CFD simulations of liquid sodium conjugate heat transfer is assessed. This paper mainly proves that it is feasible to use the four-equation model in the study of liquid metal conjugate heat transfer and provides a reference for the research of conjugate heat transfer in a liquid-metal-cooled fast reactor.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.335-344
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• 2006

In this paper a computer program was developed, which simulates the Li reduction process of PWR spent fuel, and the amount of a produced metal or chloride compound was calculated at the various amount of Li with the program. It establishes a database, which is composed of some characteristics related to a chemical reaction equation and thermodynamic data, and it calculates the transformed rate of PWR spent fuel oxide at the certain amount of Li by using the database as input data. As the results of the performance test of the program, it was validated that the transformed values of oxides, except for $Eu_2O_3$ and $Sm_2O_3$, were almost the same to within about a 6 % error with those calculated by the previous code and that the calculated amount of Li was also exactly consistent with the theoretical one, which is used for a complete reaction of each oxide in a single chemical reaction. A relationship between Li and the transformed metal of each oxide was analyzed on the basis of the quantities calculated with the verified development program. Of the results, when the amount of Li was given to be 250 mole, the 83.73 percentage of $UO_2$ was transformed into U while the remainder was still to be $UO_2$. In addition, it was appeared that the 297 mole of Li was needed to completely convert $UO_2$ into U.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.283-296
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• 2008

The numerical simulations for groundwater flow were carried out to support the input parameters for safety assessment in LILW repository site. As the input parameters for safety assessment, the groundwater flux into the underground facilities during construction, flow rate through the disposal silo after closure of disposal silo and flow pathway from the disposal silo to discharge area were analyzed using the 10 cases groundwater flow simulations. From the total 10 numerical simulation results, the statistics of estimated output were similar to among 10 cases. In some cases, the analyzed input parameters were strongly governed by locally existed high permeable fracture zone at radioactive waste disposed depth. Indeed, numerical simulation for well scenario as a human intrusion scenario was carried out using the hydraulically severe case model. Using the results of well scenario, the input parameters for safety assessment were also obtained through the numerical simulation.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Process Engineers
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• v.13 no.5
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• pp.50-56
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• 2014

A technique based on the finite element method (FEM) is used in the simulation of metal cutting process. This offers the advantages of the prediction of the cutting force, the stresses, the temperature, the tool wear, and optimization of the cutting condition, the tool shape and the residual stress of the surface. However, the accuracy and reliability of prediction depend on the flow stress of the workpiece. There are various models which describe the relationship between the flow stress and the strain. The Johnson-Cook model is a well-known material model capable of doing this. Low-alloy steel is developed for a dry storage container for used nuclear fuel. Related to this, a process analysis of the plastic machining capability is necessary. For a plastic processing analysis of machining or forging, there are five parameters that must be input into the Johnson-Cook model in this paper. These are (1) the determination of the strain-hardening modulus and the strain hardening exponent through a room-temperature tensile test, (2) the determination of the thermal softening exponent through a high-temperature tensile test, (3) the determination of the cutting forces through an orthogonal cutting test at various cutting speeds, (4) the determination of the strain-rate hardening modulus comparing the orthogonal cutting test results with FEM results. (5) Finally, to validate the Johnson-Cook material parameters, a comparison of the room-temperature tensile test result with a quasi-static simulation using LS-Dyna is necessary.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.67-75
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• 2013

The flow stress of zircaloy-4 used in the spacer grid supporting a nuclear fuel rod was determined by the Johnson-Cook model, and model parameters were determined using reverse engineering. Parameters such as A, B, n and $\dot{\varepsilon}_0$ were determined by the tensile test result. To obtain the parameters C and m, a slot milling test and numerical simulation were performed. The objective functions were defined as the difference between the experimental and the simulation results, and then, the parameters were determined by minimizing the objective function. To verify the validity of the determined parameters, cross-verification for each case was conducted through a shearing test and simulation. The results tend to show agreement with the experimental results, such as the features of sheared edges and maximum punch force, with the correlation coefficients exceeding at least 0.97.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.147-176
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• 2019

This paper uses research on the Levelized Cost of Electricity (LCOE) in South Korea to conduct a simulation analysis on the impact of nuclear power dependency and usage rates on the social costs of power generation. We compare the $7^{th}$ basic plan for long-term electricity supply and demand, which was designed to increase nuclear power generation, to the $8^{th}$ basic plan for long-term electricity supply and demand that decreased nuclear power generation and increased renewable energy generation in order to estimate changes in social costs and electricity rates according to the power generation mix. Our environmental generation mix simulation results indicate that social costs may increase by 22% within 10 years while direct generation cost and electricity rates based on generation and other production costs may increase by as much as 22% and 18%, respectively. Thus we confirm that the power generation mix from the $8^{th}$ basic plan for long-term electricity supply and demand compared to the $7^{th}$ plan increases social costs of generation, which include environmental external costs.

• Journal of Korean Institute of Industrial Engineers
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• v.41 no.3
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• pp.259-266
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• 2015

Among many energy resources, natural gas has recently received a remarkable amount of attention, particularly from the electrical generation industry. This is in part due to increasing shale gas production, providing an environment-friendly fossil fuel, and high risk of nuclear power. Because South Korea, the world's second largest LNG importing nation after Japan, has no international natural gas pipelines and relies on imports in the form of LNG, the natural gas has been traditionally procured by long term LNG contracts at relatively high price. Thus, there is a need of developing an Asian LNG trading hub, where LNG can be traded at more competitive spot prices. In a natural gas spot market, the amount of natural gas to be bought should be carefully determined considering a limited storage capacity and future pricing dynamics. In this work, the problem to find the optimal amount of natural gas in a spot market is formulated as a Markov decision process (MDP) in risk neutral environment and the optimal base stock policy which depends on a stage and price is established. Taking into account price and demand uncertainties, the basestock target levels are simply approximated from dynamic programming. The simulation results show that the basestock policy can be one of effective ways for procurement of LNG in a spot market.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.237-246
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• 2012

In this study, numerical model for transport of radionuclide and colloid was developed. In order to solve reaction-migration governing equation for colloid and radionuclide, Strang-splitting Sequential Non-Iterative (SNI), which is one of Operator Splitting Method, was used for numerical method and this was coded by MATLAB. From the verification by comparing the simulation results with analytical solution considering only solute transport and rock diffusion, the Pearson's correlation coefficient was greater than 0.99 which demonstrates the accuracy of the model.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.135-151
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• 2014

It is very important to properly understand such "Transport Pathways" elements as "Pipe" and "Cell" pathways in commercial GoldSim Transport Module (GTM) for developing higer quality models and programs for performance assessment of complex radioactive waste repositories. With an illustrative case under an earthquake scenario, by which an increasement in the groundwater flow rate occurs though the geological medium, ways of avoiding possible modeling errors in the nuclide transport modeling in the radioactive waste repository system for its safety assessment by utilizing such pathways are discussed and a proper usage of the pathways is proposed.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.439-455
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• 2020

Numerical model was developed that simulates radionuclide (3H and 14C) transport modeling at the 2nd phase facility at the Wolsong LILW Disposal Center. Four scenarios were simulated with different assumptions about the integrity of the components of the barrier system. For the design case, the multi-barrier system was shown to be effective in diverting infiltration water around the vaults containing radioactive waste. Nevertheless, the volatile radionuclide 14C migrates outside the containment system and through the unsaturated zone, driven by gas diffusion. 3H is largely contained within the vaults where it decays, with small amounts being flushed out in the liquid state. Various scenarios were examined in which the integrity of the cover barrier system or that of the concrete were compromised. In the absence of any engineered barriers, 3H is washed out to the water table within the first 20 years. The release of 14C by gas diffusion is suppressed if percolation fluxes through the facility are high after a cover failure. However, the high fluxes lead to advective transport of 14C dissolved in the liquid state. The concrete container is an effective barrier, with approximately the same effectiveness as the cover.