• Tunnel and Underground Space
• /
• v.32 no.6
• /
• pp.491-501
• /
• 2022

Bentonite has been proposed as a buffer and backfill material for high-level radioactive waste repository. Under such repository environment conditions, bentonite is subjected to combined thermal, hydrological, mechanical, and chemical processes. This study evaluates the feasibility of applying X-ray CT technology on the characterization of bentonite under hydration conditions using a newly developed testing cell. The cylindrical cell is made of platic material, with a removable cap to place the sample, enabling to apply vertical pressure on the sample and to measure swelling pressure. The hydration test was carried out with a sample made of Gyeonju bentonite, with a dry density of 1.4 g/cm³, and a water content of 20%. The sample had a diameter of 27.5 mm and a height of 34 mm. During the test, water was injected at a constant pressure of 0.207 MPa, and lasted for 7 days. After one day of hydration, bentonite swelled and filled out the space inside the cell. Moreover, CT histograms showed how the hydration process induced an initial increase and later progressive decrease on the density of the sample. Detailed profiles of the mean CT value, CT standard deviation, and CT gradient provided more details on the hydration process of the sample and showed how the bottom and top regions exhibited a decrease on density while the middle region showed an increase, especially during the first two days of hydration. Later, the differences in CT values with respect to the initial state decreased, and were small at the end of testing. The formation and later reduction of cracks was also characterized through CT scanning.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
• /
• v.46 no.3
• /
• pp.265-278
• /
• 2002

A concept test was administered to college students and teachers to identify their understanding of chemical equilibrium and equilibrium shift. The subjects were 53 freshmen in the General Chemistry class, 28 juniors in the Physical Chemistry class and 26 seniors from a university and 10 high school teachers in Seoul. Test items include the calculations of partial pressure and concentration of the gas in the mixture, the equilibrium constant cal-culation and the prediction of equilibrium shift when an inert gas is added to the gaseous reaction system, and the equilibrium concentration calculation and the prediction of equilibrium shift when water or common ion is added to the weak acid solution. The test was focused to identify whether the subjects can predict equilibrium shift using the reaction quotient change for the situations in which Le Chatelier principle is difficult to apply. The results showed that the achievements of teachers and juniors were significantly higher than those of freshmen and seniors. Many stu-dents had difficulties in predicting equilibrium shift using the reaction quotient while they could calculate partial pres-sure and concentration for the same situation. It means they are lack of conceptual understanding of chemical equilibrium shift.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
• /
• v.21 no.9
• /
• pp.32-38
• /
• 2020

Cargo train braking uses the pressure changes in the air braking pipe to operate the braking tightening and releasing service repeatedly. Air-braking release failure means partial braking caused by a failure of the variable load valve after the driver handling the brake release. This phenomenon causes wheel flaws while driving a wagon, resulting in wheel breakage or train derailment. This study developed the air-braking release failure proof valve considering the technical requirements of the railway operation corporations. In addition, a durability test of the valve was carried out using a braking performance simulator, and its operating performance was evaluated from the pneumatic history under cyclic braking conditions. The warranty life of this valve was assessed by performing 160,000 cycles of testing of 12 prototypes in accordance with the zero-failure test method, considering the number of braking cycles while driving the wagon. During the durability test, the pneumatic input time, output time, and release velocity were almost constant. The warranty life of this valve was 59,860 times the 95% confidence level, which means that it can be operated without trouble for four years when the valve is installed in the bogie of the wagon.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
• /
• v.19 no.11
• /
• pp.688-694
• /
• 2018

The mixture ratio of two-component liquid silicone is important for the inherent physical characteristics of the finished product. Therefore, it is necessary to uniformly control the ratio of the main material and the sub-material. In this paper, a mixing-ratio control system was designed, which consists of a digital flow meter and a flow control system to measure the flow rate of the raw materials and a pumping system to maintain constant pressure and transfer of the raw materials. In addition, a program was developed to control the organic interlocking and mixing ratio. For the verification of the developed system, we compared the actual weight of raw material with the value measured by the flow meter during pumping, and we measured the physical properties of the mixed material by making test samples with and without the application of the mixing-ratio improvement algorithm. The measured value was close to the reference value with a hardness range of 46-47 and tensile strength of 9.3-9.5 MPa. These results show that the mixing ratio of the liquid silicone is controlled within an error range of ${\pm}0.5%$.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
• /
• v.31 no.6
• /
• pp.610-622
• /
• 2021

The DECOVALEX project is one of the representative international cooperative projects to enhance the understanding of the complex Thermo-Hydro-Mechanical-Chemical(THMC) coupled behavior in the high-level radioactive waste disposal system based on the numerical simulation. DECOVALEX-2023 is the current phase consisting of 7 tasks, and Task C aims to model the THM coupled behavior in the disposal system based on the Full-scale Emplacement (FE) experiment at the Mont-Terri underground rock laboratory. This study performs the numerical simulation based on the OGS-FLAC developed for the current study. In the numerical model, we emplaced the heater with constant power horizontally based on the FE experiment and monitored the pressure development, temperature increase, and mechanical deformation at the specific monitoring points. We monitored the capillary pressure as the primary effect inducing the flow in the buffer system, and thermal stress and pressurization were dominant in the surrounding rocks' area. The results will also be compared and validated with the other participating groups and the experimental data further.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• v.54 no.11
• /
• pp.4348-4358
• /
• 2022

The thermal-hydraulics phenomena in a containment during an accident will necessarily include radiative heat transfer (i) within the gas mixture due to the high radiative absorption and emission of steam and (ii) between the gas mixture and the surrounding structures. The analysis of some previous PANDA experiments (PSI, Switzerland) demonstrated the importance of the proper modelling of radiation for the benefit of numerical simulations. These results together with dedicated scoping calculations conducted for the present experiments indicated that the radiative heat transfer is considerable, even for a very low amount of steam (≈2%). The H2P2 series conducted in the large-scale PANDA facility at the Paul-Scherrer-Institut (PSI) in the framework of the OECD/NEA HYMERES-2 project is intended to enhance the understanding of thermal radiation phenomena and to provide a benchmark for corresponding numerical simulations. Thus, the test matrix was tailored around the two opposite extremes: either gas compositions with small steam content such that radiative heat transfer phenomena can be neglected. Or gas mixtures containing larger amounts of steam, so that radiative heat transfer is expected to play a dominant role. The H2P2 series consists of 5 experiments designed to isolate the radiation phenomena from convective and diffusive effects as much as possible. One vessel with a diameter of 4 m and a height of 8 m was preconditioned with different mixtures of air / steam at room and elevated temperatures. This was followed by the build-up of a stable helium stratification at constant pressure in the upper part of the vessel. After that, helium was injected from the top into the vessel which leads to an increase of the vessel pressure and a corresponding elevation-dependent and transient rise of the gas temperature. It is shown that even the addition of small amounts of steam in the initial gas atmosphere considerably impacts the radiative heat transport throughout all phases of the experiments and markedly influences i) the monitored gas peak temperature, ii) the temperature history during the compression and iii) the following relaxation phase after the compression was stopped. These PANDA experiments are the first of its kind conducted in a large scale thermal-hydraulic facility.

• Journal of the Korean Wood Science and Technology
• /
• v.23 no.4
• /
• pp.39-45
• /
• 1995

The plywoods commonly used as decorative interior materials for the construction are inflammable and so it is a causative factor for making fire accidents, resulting in the destruction of human life and personal properties. Indeed, it is, therefore, required to produce fire-retardant plywoods. In this study, a special grade of defect-free, Kapur plywood was used. Specimens were cut into 3- by 20cm dimensions from 120- by 240- by 0.33-cm panels(thin panel) or 120- by 240- by 0.5-cm panels(thick panel). Some specimens were treated with diammonium phosphate(DAP), but some were not treated with diammonium phosphate to use as control panels. Chemical absorption, drying curves, drying rates and dynamic Young's modulus were investigated. The results were summaries as follows; 1. The specimens were soaked into 19% diammonium phosphate solution by a full cell pressure process and the diammonium phosphate retained in the thin and thick plywoods was 1.409kg/$(30cm)^3$, 1.487kg/$(30cm)^3$, respectively. 2. Diammonium phosphate-treated plywoods were redried with press-drying process at one of either condition dried on the platen($115^{\circ}C$) for a period of time or dried on the platen($50^{\circ}C$) for 3 hrs plus in a dry-oven($30^{\circ}C$) for 24 hrs. or dried on the platen($60^{\circ}C$) for 2 hrs plus in a dry-oven($30^{\circ}C$) for 24 hrs. The drying rate of treated thin specimens dried at $60^{\circ}C$ plus $30^{\circ}C$ and $115^{\circ}C$ only was found to be 0.04 %/min. and 8.53 %/min. Similarly, the drying rate of treated thick specimens were 0.03 %/min. and 6.77 %/min. respectively. 3. It was evident that highly-significantly different drying rate of treated plywoods was observed between plywood thicknesses and platen temperatures and the rate was increased by elevating the platen temperature up to $115^{\circ}C$. Based on the two-way variance analysis, highly significant drying rate was observed from the interaction between plywood thicknesses and platen temperatures. 4. After redrying, the specimens were weighed and reconditioned to a constant weight in a facility maintained temperature ($20^{\circ}C$) and relative humidity(65%) prior to test dynamic Young's modulus. The test revealed that the thin specimens dried at the platen temperature of $50^{\circ}C$, $60^{\circ}C$, $115^{\circ}C$ and untreated specimens showed 1.070E+09 dyne/$cm^2$, 1.156E+09 dyne/$cm^2$, 1.243E+09 dyne/$cm^2$, and 1.052E+09 dyne/$cm^2$, respectively. Likewise, the thick specimens revealed 5.647E+09 dyne/$cm^2$ 5.670E+09 dyne/$cm^2$, 6.395E+09 dyne/$cm^2$ and 5.415E+09 dyne/$cm^2$, respectively. 5. It was evident that significantly different dynamic Young's modulus was observed between the plywood thickness and the platen temperature, but not in the two-way interaction between the plywood thickness${\times}$the platen temperature.

• The Journal of Engineering Geology
• /
• v.30 no.2
• /
• pp.147-160
• /
• 2020

Unsaturated hydraulic conductivity of near-surface unconsolidated layers depends on the physical properties and water content of the unconsolidated layers. So far, many studies have been conducted on the unsaturated hydraulic conductivity of near-surface unconsolidated layers. However, researches on hydraulic conductivity of unsaturated fractured rocks have been relatively rare. In relation to the construction of a low/intermediate level radioactive waste surface-disposal facility, this study compared and analyzed van Genuchten parameters (α, n) in the laboratory and the hydraulic conductivity obtained in field tests for fractured hornfels at a radioactive-waste disposal site of Korea. The relationship between the field hydraulic conductivity and van Genuchten parameters using data from the ten depth intervals of three boreholes resulted in that the correlation coefficient (R) between the hydraulic conductivity and the van Genuchten parameter α was 0.7607, showing positive correlation whereas the R between the hydraulic conductivity and the van Genuchten shape-defining parameter n was -0.8720, showing negative correlation. Hence, this study confirmed the relationship between the field hydraulic conductivity and the van Genuchten unsaturated functions for the unsaturated fractured hornfels.

• Geophysics and Geophysical Exploration
• /
• v.15 no.4
• /
• pp.209-218
• /
• 2012

Repeatability and reproducibility in solid weight and effective porosity measurements have been discussed using 8 core samples with different diameters, lengths, rock types, and effective porosities. Further, the effect of temperature on the effective porosity measurement has been discussed as well. Effective porosity of each sample has been measured 7 times with vacuum saturation method with vacuum pressure of 1 torr and vacuum time of 80 minutes. Firstly, effective porosity of each sample is measured one by one, so that it can provide a reference value. Then for reproducibility check, effective porosity measurements with vacuum saturation of 2, 4, and 8 samples simultaneously have been performed. And finally, repeated measurements for 3 times for each sample are made for repeatability check. Average deviation from the reference set in solid weight showed 0.00 $g/cm^3$, which means perfect repeatability and reproducibility. For effective porosity, average deviations are less than 0.07% and 0.05% in repeatability and reproducibility test sets, respectively, which are in good agreement too. Most of porosities measured in reproducibility test lies within the deviation range in repeatability test sets. Thus, simultaneous vacuum saturation of several samples has little impact on the effective porosity measurement when high vacuum pressure of 1 torr is used. Air temperature can cause errors on submerged weight read and even effective porosity, because it is closely related to the temperature, density, and buoyancy of water. Consequently, for accurate measurement of effective porosity in a laboratory, efforts for maintaining air or water temperature constant during the experiment, or a temperature correction from other information are needed.

• Korean Journal of Plant Resources
• /
• v.27 no.5
• /
• pp.546-555
• /
• 2014

The final aim of this study is to develop a biofiltration system integrated with plant vegetation for improving indoor air quality effectively depending on indoor space and characteristics. However, to approach this final goal, several requirements such as constant pressure drops (PDs) and soil moisture contents (SMCs), which influence the capacity design for a proper ventilation rate of biofiltration system, should be satisfied. Thus, this fundamental experiment was carried out to adjust a proper wind speed and to ensure a stabilization of initial SMCs within biofilter for uniform distribution of SMCs and PDs, and for normal plant growth, especially avoiding root stress by wind. Therefore, we designed horizontal biofliter models and manufactured them, and then calculated the ventilation rate, air residence time, and air-liquid ration based on the biofilter depending on three levels of wind speed (1, 2, and $3cm{\cdot}s^{-1}$). The relative humidity (RH) and PD of the humidified air coming out through the soil within the biofilter, and SMC of the soil and plant growth parameters of lettuce and duffy fern grown within biofilter were measured depending on the three levels of wind speed. As a result of wind speed test, $3{\cdot}sec^{-1}$ was suitable to keep up a proper RH, SMC, and plant growth. Thus, the next experiment was set up to be two levels of initial SMCs (low and high initial SMC, 18.5 and 28.7%) within each biofilter operated and a non-biofiltered control (initial SMC, 29.7%) on the same wind speed ($3cm{\cdot}sec^{-1}$), and measured on the RH and PD of the air coming out through the soil within the biofilter, and SMC of the soil and plant growth parameters of Humata tyermani grown within biofilter. This result was similar to the first results on RHs, SMCs, and PDs keeping up with constant levels, and three SMCs did not show any significant difference on plant growth parameters. However, two biofiltered SMCs enhanced dry weights of the plants slightly than non-biofiltered SMC. Thus, the stability of this biofiler system keeping up major physical factors (SMC and PD) deserved to be adopted for designing an advanced integrated biofilter model in the near future.