Progress Toward Molten Salt Reactor Heat Exchanger On-Line Monitoring

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Forsi ◽  
S. Glass ◽  
M. Good ◽  
R. Montgomery
Keyword(s):  
Heat Exchanger ◽  
Molten Salt ◽  
Molten Salt Reactor ◽  
On Line

Feasibility of Molten Salt Reactor Heat Exchanger On-Line Monitoring

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-5
Author(s):  
Samuel W. Glass ◽  
Morris Good ◽  
Ericka Forsi ◽  
Robert Montgomery
Keyword(s):  
Heat Exchanger ◽  
Molten Salt ◽  
Heat Exchangers ◽  
Wave Mode ◽  
Management Approach ◽  
Corrosion Monitoring ◽  
Molten Salt Reactor ◽  
Flat Bottom ◽  
Flow Area ◽  
On Line

Abstract On-line structural health corrosion monitoring in advanced molten salt reactor heat exchangers is desirable for detecting tube degradation prior to leaks that either would cause mixing of heat exchanger fluids or release of radiologically contaminated fluids beyond the design containment boundary. This program seeks to demonstrate feasibility for a torsional wave mode sensor to attach to the outside of a long (30-m) heat exchanger tube in the stagnant flow area where the tube joins the heat exchanger plenum and where it is possible to protect a sensor cable from high-force flow connecting through a heat exchanger shell to a monitoring instrument. The envisioned sensor and cable management approach will be impractical to implement on existing heat exchangers; rather sensors must be installed in conjunction with the heat exchanger fabrication. Initially, flaw surrogates of interest (50% notch and 50% flat bottom hole) have been detected in a 3-m tube using low-temperature PZT piezoelectric crystals. The transducer consisted of multiple shear elements placed circumferentially around a tube. The program will continue to investigate higher temperature piezoelectric ceramics, long-term performance of high temperature adhesives, and flaw sensitivity on long (30-m +) tubes.

Progress Toward Molten Salt Reactor Heat Exchanger On-Line Monitoring

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Forsi ◽  
S. Glass ◽  
M. Good ◽  
R. Montgomery
Keyword(s):  
Heat Exchanger ◽  
Molten Salt ◽  
Molten Salt Reactor ◽  
On Line

Feasibility of Molten Salt Reactor Heat Exchanger On-Line Monitoring

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bill Glass, III ◽  
Morris Good ◽  
Ericka Forsi ◽  
Robert Montgomery
Keyword(s):  
Heat Exchanger ◽  
Molten Salt ◽  
Molten Salt Reactor ◽  
On Line

scholarly journals Study on the Ability of PCMSR to Produce Valuable Isotopes as a By Product of Energy Generation

2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-14
Author(s):  
Andang Widiharto
Keyword(s):  
Fission Product ◽  
Molten Salt ◽  
Nuclear Reactor ◽  
Thermal Power ◽  
Processing System ◽  
Quasi Equilibrium ◽  
Molten Salt Reactor ◽  
Liquid Form ◽  
Fuel Processing ◽  
On Line

PCMSR (Passive Compact Molten Salt Reactor) is a variant of MSR (Molten Salt Reactor) type reactors. The MSR is one type of the Advanced Nuclear Reactor types. PCMSR uses mixtures of fluoride salt if the liquid form is in a high temperature operation. The use of liquid salt fuel allows the application of on line fuel processing system. The on line fuel processing system allows extraction of several valuable fission product isotopes such as Mo-99, Cs-137, Sr-89 etc. The capability of MSR to produce several valuable isotopes has been studied. This study is based on a denaturized breeder MSR design with 920 MWth of thermal power and 500 MWe of electrical output power with the thermal efficiency of 55 %. The initial composition of fuel salt is 70 % of a mole of LiF, 24 % of a mole of 232ThF4, 6 % of a mole of UF4. The enrichment level of U is 20 % of a mole of  U-235. The study is performed by a numerical calculation to solve a set of differential equations of fission product balance. This calculation calculates fission product generation due to fission reaction, precursor decay, and fission product annihilation due to decay, neutron absorption, and extraction. The calculation result shows that in quasi equilibrium conditions, the reactor can produce several valuable isotopes in substantially sufficient quantities, those are  Sr-89 (0.3 kCi/MWth/day, Sr-90 (1,91 Ci/MWth/day), Mo-99 (1.7 kCi/MWth/day), I-131 (0.42 kCi/MWth/day), I-132 (0.782 kCi/MWth/day), I-133 (1.12 kCi/MWth/day), Xe-133 (11.8 Ci/MWth/day), Cs-134 (39.3 mCi/MWth/day), Cs-137 (2.32 Ci/MWth/day) and La-140 (1.05 kCi/MWth/day).

Development of a Compact Primary Heat Exchanger for a Molten Salt Reactor

2011 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Lippy ◽  
Mark Pierson
Keyword(s):  
Heat Exchanger ◽  
Molten Salt ◽  
Heat Exchangers ◽  
Nuclear Industry ◽  
Hydrodynamic Performance ◽  
Molten Salt Reactor ◽  
Compact Heat Exchangers ◽  
Heat Exchanger Design ◽  
Fuel Salt ◽  
Shell And Tube

The first Molten Salt Reactor (MSR) was designed and tested at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in the 1960’s, but recent technological advancements now allow for new components, such as heat exchangers, to be created for the next generation of MSR’s and molten salt-cooled reactors. The primary (fuel salt-to-secondary salt) heat exchanger (PHX) design has been largely ignored up to this point; however, it is shown here that modern compact heat exchangers have the potential to make dramatic improvements over traditional shell-and-tube designs. Compact heat exchangers provide a higher effectiveness and more efficient use of material that offer a more cost-effective alternative to the massive, more expensive heat exchangers planned for the MSR. While this paper focuses on the application of compact heat exchangers on a Molten Salt Reactor, many of the analyses and results are similarly applicable to other fluid-to-fluid heat exchangers. The heat exchanger design in this study seeks to find a middle-ground between the dependable shell-and-tube design and the ultra-efficient, ultra-compact designs such as the Printed Circuit Heat Exchanger being developed today. Complex channel geometries and micro-scale dimensions in modern compact heat exchangers do not allow routine maintenance to be performed by standard procedures, so extended surfaces will be omitted and hydraulic diameters will be kept in the minichannel regime (minimum channel dimension between 200 μm and 3 mm) to allow for high-frequency eddy current inspection methods to be developed. Rather than using a “checkerboard” channel pattern, which requires complex header designs among other design challenges, row composition is homogeneous, and the borders between adjoining channels are removed to provide high aspect ratio rectangular channel cross-sections. Various plant layouts of smaller heat exchanger banks in a “modular” design are introduced, and the feasibility of casting such modules is assumed to be possible for the purposes of this research. FLUENT was used within ANSYS Workbench to find optimized heat transfer and hydrodynamic performance for straight-channel designs with two molten salts acting in pure counter-flow. Limiting the pressure drop to roughly that of ORNL’s Molten Salt Breeder Reactor’s shell-and-tube design, the compact heat exchanger design of interest in this study will lessen volume requirements, lower fuel salt volume, and decrease material usage. Compact heat exchangers have shown commercial feasibility in several industries but have yet to be assimilated into the nuclear industry. This intermediately-sized compact minichannel heat exchanger demonstrates that such a heat exchanger is viable for further testing. The original design of the MSR was an engineering marvel over 60 years ago, but several of its key components, namely the intermediate heat exchanger, must be updated in order for the MSR to reach its full potential.

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