• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2006.06a
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• pp.59-62
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• 2006

Formability is requested to successfully develop of a metal bipolar plate for mass production. From this point of view, wider channel and land width is more helpful to improve formability. But the performance of the fuel cell can be affected by its channel and land shape. So it is very important to select proper channel and land shape not to deteriorate the fuel cell performance. In this work, 3-dimensional, non-isothermal numerical simulation was performed to analyse the effects of channel and land width on the fuel cell performance. 3 types of straight channel were selected for the numerical simulation. The simulation results reveal that wide channel and land width lower fuel cell performance and decrease voltage at a high current density region. Water activity, temperature, oxygen concentration distributions were investigated to find the reasons of performance degradation. The results show that wide channel and land width give an bad effect on fuel cell performance because of low cool ins efficiency and lack of oxygen gas under the land.

• Proceedings of the Korean Nuclear Society Conference
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• 1998.05a
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• pp.719-724
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• 1998

A preliminary fuel channel analysis for 35% reactor inlet header (RIH) break in CANDU reactor loaded with the CANFLEX-RU fuel bundles has been performed. The predicted results are compared with those for the reactor compared with those for the reactor loaded with standard 37-element bundles. The maximum fuel centerline and sheath temperatures for the CANFLEX-RU bundle channel were lower by 338 and 122 $^{\circ}C$, respectively, than those for the standard bundle because of the Bower maximum linear power of the CANFLEX-RU bundle In spite of the 0.4 FPS higher power pulse of the CANFLEX-RU bundle case. Fuel integrity margin to fuel breakup for the CANFLEX-RU bundle is about 50 J/g higher than that for the standard bundle. The PT/CT contact for the CANFLEX-RU bundle occurred 2 s later than that for the standard bundle. The PT/CT contact temperature for the CANFLEX-RU bundle was 2 $^{\circ}C$ lower than that for the standard bundle. These provide the CANFLEX-RU bundle with the negligibly enhanced safety margin for the fuel channel integrity in CANDU 6 reactor, compared with the standard bundle.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.37 no.5
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• pp.479-490
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• 2005

The thermalhydraulic performance of a CANDU-6 reactor loaded with various CANFLEX fuel bundles is evaluated by the NUCIRC code, which is incorporated with recent models of pressure drop and critical heat flux (CHF) predictions based on high-pressure steam-water tests for the CANFLEX bundle as well as a 37-element bundle. The distributions of channel flow rate, channel exit quality, critical channel power (CCP), and critical power ratio (CPR) for the CANFLEX bundles (with natural or recycled uranium fuel) in the CANDU-6 reactor fuel channel are calculated by the code. The effects of axial and radial heat flux on CCP are evaluated by assuming that the recycled uranium fuel (CANFLEX-RU) has the same geometric data as the natural uranium fuel bundle (CANFLEX-NU), but a different power distribution due to different fuel composition and refueling scheme. In addition, the effects of pressure tube creep and bearing-pad height are examined by comparing various results of uncrept, and $3.3\%\;and\;5.1\%$ crept channels loaded with CANFLEX bundles with 1.4 mm or 1.7 mm high bearing-pads with those of the 37-element bundle. The distributions of the channel flow rate and CCP for the CANFLEX-NU or -RU bundle show a typical trend for a CANDU-6 reactor channel, and the CPRs are maintained above at least 1.444 (NU) or 1.455 (RU) in the uncrept channel. The enhanced CHF of the CANFLEX bundle (particularly with 1.7mm height bearing-pads) produces a higher thermal margin and considerably less sensitivity to CCP reduction due to the pressure tube creep than the 37-element bundle. The CCP enhancement due to the raised bearing-pads is estimated to be about $3\%\~5\%$ for the CANFLEX-NU and $2\%\~6\%$ for the CANFLEX-RU bundle, respectively.

• New & Renewable Energy
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.14-19
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• 2007

A flow channel model of a bipolar plate with varying cross-sectional area was newly designed for improving performance and efficiency of a PEM fuel cell stack. As a result, the varying cross-sectional area model showed poor uniformity in velocity distribution, however, maximum velocity in the flow path is about 30% faster than that of the uniform cross-sectional area model. The proposed varying cross-sectional area model is expected to diffuse operating fluids more easily into diffusion layer because it has relatively higher values in pressure distribution compared with other flow channel models. It is expected that the implementation of the varying cross-sectional area model can reduce not only the mass transport loss but also the activation loss in a PEM fuel cell, and open circuit voltage of a fuel cell can thus be increased slightly.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.159-165
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• 2004

Fuel cell makes electricity through chemical reaction. Bipolar-plate distribute hydrogen, oxidation using channel geometry condensation of water vapor inside channels of bipolar-plates lowers efficiency of fuel cell. Usually high pressured gas supply is used to solve the water condensation problem with serpentine type channel geometry. In this study, a new channel geometry shows feasible to minimize lowering efficiency due to water condensation through numerical and experimental analysis.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.60-67
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• 2016

A pressurized heavy water reactor (PHWR) designed to refuel in service produces the energy required by nuclear fission. The fuel channel consists of components such as a pressure tube which directly contacts the fuel and is a passage for the reactor coolant, a calandria tube which contacts the moderator and is rolled joint with calandria, and a spacer which is not to contact the pressure tube and a calandria tube. As the fuel channel is one of the most important equipments, it requires accurate and periodic inspections to assess the integrity of a reactor in accordance with CSA N285.4. A fuel channel inspection system is developed to inspect fuel channels during in-service inspection in Wolsong unit. In this paper, the results and considerations of a field test are presented in order to show the effectiveness of the developed fuel channel inspection system.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.52 no.11
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• pp.2415-2421
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• 2020

The axial heterogeneous void distribution in a fuel channel is a relevant and important issue during nuclear reactor analysis for LWR, especially for boiling water channel-type reactors. Variation of the coolant density in fuel channel has an effect on the neutron spectrum that will in turn have an impact on the values of absolute reactivity, the void reactivity coefficient, and the fuel isotopic compositions during irradiation. This effect is referring to as the history effect in light water reactor calculations. As the void reactivity effect is positive in RBMK type reactors, the underestimation of water density heterogeneity in 3D reactor core numerical calculations could cause an uncertainty during assessment of safe operation of nuclear reactor. Thus, this issue is analysed with different cross-section libraries which were generated with WIMS8 code at different reference water densities. The libraries were applied in single fuel model of the nodal code of QUABOX-CUBBOX/HYCA. The thermohydraulic part of HYCA allowed to simulate axial water distribution along fuel assembly model and to estimate water density history effect for RBMK type fuel.

• Transactions of the Korean hydrogen and new energy society
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.41-55
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• 2018

General polymer electrolyte fuel cell (PEMFC) operates at less than $80^{\circ}C$. Therefore liquid phase water resulting from electrochemical reaction accumulates and floods the cell which in turn increases the mass transfer loss. To prevent the flooding, it is common to employ serpentine flow channel, which can efficiently export liquid phase water to the outlet. The major drawback of utilizing serpentine flow channel is the large pressure drop that happens between the inlet and outlet. On the other hand, in the high temperature polymer electrolyte fuel cell (HT-PEMFC), since the operating temperature is 130 to $180^{\circ}C$, the generated water is in the state of gas, so the flooding phenomenon is not taken into consideration. In HT-PEMFCs parallel flow channel with lower pressure drop between the inlet and outlet is employed therefore, in order to circulate hydrogen and air in the cell less pumping power is required. In this study we analyzed HT-PEMFC's different flow channels by parallel computation using previously developed 3-D isothermal model. All the flow channels had an active area of $25cm^2$. Also, we numerically compared the performance of HT-PEMFC parallel flow channel with different manifold area and Rib interval against the original serpentine flow channel. Results of the analysis are shown in the form of three-dimensional contour polarization curves, flow characteristics in the channel, current density distribution in the Membrane, overpotential distribution in the catalyst layer, and hydrogen and oxygen concentration distribution. As a result, the performance of a real area fuel cell was predicted.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2003.11a
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• pp.345-349
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• 2003

The dynamic behavior of CANDU nuclear fuel channel was analyzed by the use of 3-dimensional finite element method, under the various fault conditions such as a fault in the end fitting support and the removal/migration of the garter spring in the fuel channel, in order to predict the dynamic behavior for a degraded symptoms of CANDU nuclear fuel channel. Moreover, the frequency response analysis for possible fault conditions was also peformed considering the effects of the pressure tube vibration and flow-induced vibration by the coolant flow. From the analysis of the frequency responses, defects in the garter spring have influenced the changes of 2nd and 3rd modes and all the important modes are varied for the failure in the journal bearing in the end fitting body.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2006.06a
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• pp.81-84
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• 2006

To investigate the characteristics of water droplet on the gas diffusion layer from both upper-view and side-view of flow channel, a rig test apparatus was designed and fabricated with L-shape acryl plate in a $1mm{\times}1mm$ micro-channel. This experimental device is used to simulate the single droplet growth and its transport process under fuel cell operating condition. As a first step, we investigated the growth and transport of single water droplet with working temperature and air flow velocity. The contact angle and its hysteresis of water droplet at departing moment are measured and analyzed. It is expected that this study can provide the basic understanding of liquid water droplet behavior in gas flow channel and GDL interface during the PEM fuel cell operation.