Overview of Industry Applications

Fausto Franceschini Andrew GodfreyAdvanced Modeling Applications

Joint Industry/Science Council MeetingOak Ridge National Laboratory

October 11, 2017

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Contents

• Recent accomplishments and results• Industry engagement and Test Stands• Release testing performance• F717 challenges • FY18 proposed applications• CASL OECD/NEA benchmark activity

Everything you see today is new (i.e. within the last 6 months)

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Power Plant Models• 18 in-progress or completed reactor models

– Watts Bar, AP1000, Krško, McGuire, Catawba, Oconee, Seabrook, Callaway, TMI, Palo Verde, Byron 1, Davis-Besse, Farley, South Texas, NuScale, (BEAVRS)

• 6 new models proposed for next year– Vogtle, Byron 2, North Anna, Robinson, VC Summer, Point Beach

• Includes over 100 fuel cycles• Direct collaboration with many

industry organizations– Westinghouse, TVA, EPRI– AREVA, Arizona, Duke Energy,

Exelon, NuScale, Southern

Industry Engagement Continues to Increase

TVA’s Watts Bar Nuclear Plant

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1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19 21 23 25 27 29 31

Triti

um M

ass p

er R

od (g

)

TPBAR Number

WB1C2 Tritium MassesMeasuredExplicit Calculated Production Average

Relative Error = +0.9%

Watts Bar Update

• Update for Unit 1 Cycle 15• Assisting TVA and PNNL with

investigating power distribution anomaly– Investigating explicit TPBAR model for

Tritium Technology Program (NNSA)– Supporting the release and build of VERA

at PNNL• Supporting Westinghouse and TVA

analyses of Unit 2 Cycle 2 design

VERA results are actively being considered for current industry issues

Explicit TPBARGeometry

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WB1 Cycle 2 Comparisons to In-Core Reaction Rates with Explicit Model

BOC – 1.0 GWD/MT MOC – 7.1 GWD/MT EOC – 13.5 GWD/MT

0

1

2

3

4

5

0 5 10 15

Reac

tion

Rate

Diff

eren

ce (C

-M, %

)

Cycle Exposure (GWd/MTU)

Radial RMSTotal RMSRadial TPBAR Difference

• Good agreement with measured instrument reaction rates in the TPBAR location– Excellent at BOC < 0.1% difference– Up to 3% difference in radial power

over the cycle, trending with burnup

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Catawba 2 Update• Benchmarking completed for Cycles 8-21• Included fuel transition from Mk-BW to RFA fuel types

– Axial shift in fuel stack modeled explicitly• Comparisons to over 50 flux maps

– Both 61 and 610 level data• Zero power physics tests

comparisons Cycles 18-21• Draft report in progress

• C2C22 Shutdown Margin analyses completed by Lange

Duke Energy’s Catawba Nuclear Station

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C2C22 CIPS Shutdown Margin Penalty Results• An increased risk of CIPS also

includes a potential loss of shutdown margin (SDM)

• VERA can directly simulate the reactivity worth of boron in deposited in the CRUD, as well as axial burnup effects

• In this case, the difference in SDM between candidate patterns of varying CIPS risk was considered small

050

100150200250300350

0 200 400 600

CIPS

Pen

alty (

pcm

)Cycle Exposure (EFPD)

Low Risk Medium Risk High Risk

BOA Risk LevelMax Core

Crud BoronMax CIPS SDM Penalty (pcm)

Normalized CIPS SDM Penalty (pcm)

Low Risk 0.292 224 0 Medium Risk 0.350 275 51High Risk 0.410 326 102

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Other New Plant Models

• Palo Verde 2 – Cycles 1-9 preliminary depletions completed• TMI – Cycle 6 jump in completed• Callaway – Cycles 1-7 completed• Oconee 3 – Cycle 25 jump-in completed• Byron 1 – Cycles 17-21 completed• Davis-Besse – Cycles 12-15 completed (AREVA)• Farley 1 – Cycles 23-28 completed• South Texas 2 – Cycles 1-8 completed • AP1000 – Cycles 1-5 completed• NuScale SMR – Cycles 1-8 completed

Successful application to a variety of plant and fuel types

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B&W Critical Experiments• Completed analysis of the 1484

and 1810 experiments• Reactivity and pin powers

validation• Very typical industry code

benchmark• 1484 Results: -96 ± 68 pcm• 1810 pin power differences are

all <1% RMS (2.5% max) and are very similar to CASMO-5 results

MPACT results are good and compare well to respected industry code

-300

-200

-100

0

100

200

300

1 2 3 4 5 5A 5B 6 6A 7 8 9 10 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20Re

activ

ity D

iffer

ence

(pcm

)

1810 Core

1810 ResultsCASMO5 (No RUP)

MPACT (No RUP)

MPACT (RUP)

CASMO5 = 84±77MPACT = 3±69MPACT (RUP) = -75±69

RUP=Resonance Upscatter Option

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Assessment of VERA RIA Transient Capability

• Initial AP1000 Rod Ejection Accident simulated by Westinghouse

• Requirements are computationally intensive– Full core geometry– Full transient coupling between

MPACT and CTF– Multiple initial conditions (HZP,HFP)

• Initial application of CTF dynamic fuel rod gap model

• Needed improvements identified and communicated to developers

• Level 1 DOE Milestone being planned for FY18

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Margin Assessment of OTDT Reactor Trip Setpoints with VERA

• VERA can provide more accurate calculations of core power distributions and DNB margin in accident scenarios

• Safety margin can be recaptured or reallocated to improve operating space or reduce fuel costs

• Focus on input to reactor protection system Over-Temperature Delta-T (OTΔT) and the Over-Power Delta-T (OPΔT) trip

• Preliminary results indicate significant increases in safety margins

• Additional evaluation and uncertainty quantification of the OTDT setpointsand operating margin improvement will be performed in FY18

Single assembly OTDT analysis using WB-1 Correlation

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Transient CTF Validation• Reasonable accuracy achieved with a

proper DNB correlation for PSBT transient DNB scenarios

• RIA-like conditions of the Patricia and NSRR experiments had mixed results– Good predictions of fluid conditions under

forced coolant flow– Pool-type test showed deficit in CTF

capabilities• Pellet thermal conductivity and gap

conductance models validated based on data from Halden and VIPRE-01 comparisons. Metal water reaction and fuel relocation and degradation modes were also confirmed

PSBT Test – 5x5 Fuel Rods

Patricia TestSection

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AMA Supports CASL Test Stands• University of Illinois (Exelon)

– Test Stand completed and transitioning to more direct AMA engagement/milestones with Exelon

– Byron Unit 1 Cycles 17-21 completed successfully– Performing Load-Follow simulations– Needs BISON performance improvements

• AREVA– Davis-Besse Cycles 12-15 completed– Waiting on MAMBA for CIPS simulations

• NuScale– Eight SMR fuel cycles completed– Radial reflector benchmark completed successfully – Waiting on MAMBA for CRUD simulations

• Westinghouse– BISON application for ATF (NEAMS)– U3Si2 fuel pellets, Coated ZIRLO and SiC cladding

Sample Davis-BesseCycle 19 Power Distribution with

Gadolinia depletion

NuScale SMR Radial Core Structure

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Analysis Platforms and Builds• ORNL CADES Panacea: Directorate level ~5000 core resource

time-shared with other programs– Less cores, less users

• OLCF Eos and Titan: HPC Supercomputers at ORNL– More cores, more users, limited wall-times

• INL Falcon– More cores, moderate users, longer wall-times

• Industry computers– Westinghouse, AREVA, EPRI each have VERA on their own computers

• Government Entities– Pacific Northwest Nat’l Lab (PNNL), Naval Nuclear Lab (KAPL)

• Multiple Universities– Univ. of Illinois, Univ. of Michigan, NCSU, UTK, etc.

More Resources are Needed for Increasing Applications

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VERA 3.6 Release Testing

AMA provided significant review and testing of VERA 3.6 Release Candidate 0 prior to its public release in March, 2017. Applications performed prior to the release were:

Currently AMA is testing VERA 3.7 Release Candidate 4, to be released publicly very soon.

Close Collaboration with PHI

Watts Bar Unit 1 Cycles 1-14 benchmark calculations for L3:AMA.RX.P14.02 • Watts Bar Unit 2 Cycle 1 updated startup calculations for L2:AMA.P14.01 • Krsko Cycles 1-3 benchmark calculations • Seabrook Cycle 1 depletion • Catawba Unit 2 Cycles 18-22 benchmark and CIPS simulations (including jump-in) for

L3:AMA.CP.P14.03 • AP1000 PWR generic Cycle 1 model HZP BOC and ARO depletion • Sanmen Unit 1 Cycle 1 HZP BOC predictions for L2:AMA.P15.01 • AP1000 PWR generic Cycle 1 MSHIM depletion for L3:AMA.RX.P15.01 • AP1000 PWR equilibrium cycle MSHIM depletion for L3:AMA.RX.P15.01 • Haiyang Unit 1 Cycle 1 HZP BOC predictions for L2:AMA.P15.01 • One of the ODEN subchannel tests series • One of the Takahama transient test series for DNB application for L3:AMA.CP.P15.08 • Executed a transient full core CTF simulation for L3:AMA.CP.P15.08 • Installed on Westinghouse Binford computer

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FY17 – Critical Review

• More time was required than expected to obtain NDAs and receive proprietary data

• In a few instances staff did not have the expected availability because of emergent industry work

• Predominately, the main problem was code readiness for planned analyses– MAMBA rewrite meant no new CRUD applications in FY17– SHIFT excore capability is still under development and not ready for users– BISON convergence and repeatability issues prevented complete results for whole-

core risk evaluations

AMA is often on the bleeding edge of development

Of all FY17 AMA technical milestones, only 50-60% were completed “successfully”. What happened?

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FY18 - New Applications Proposed• MAMBA CIPS validation for multiple plants

– Watts Bar, Seabrook, Callaway, Palo Verde, TMI, Catawba, Vogtle, Byron• Initial CILC applications

– Seabrook, Palo Verde, TMI, Oconee• Two RIA applications for MPACT+CTF• PCI/Load follow application(s)

– Byron, TBD• PIE benchmarks

– TMI, North Anna, Catawba, Robinson• AP1000 startup benchmarking• Multi-cycle vessel fluence calculations• Excore detector response benchmarking• Source driven problem applications• Xenon transient benchmarks

~50% of proposed milestones require

capabilities that currently do not exist or have not been tested

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Power Plants25%

Ex-core Transport9%

PIE Validation9%

Monte Carlo1%

BWR2%

CIPS10%

CILC10%

RIA7%

LOCA4%

PCI8%

DNB7%

ATF8%

FY18 – Subproject Split (Proposed)

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New CASL OECD/NEA Benchmark

• Joint effort between ORNL and NCSU (K. Ivanov) for a new published reactor benchmark problem based on Watts Bar Unit 1

• Will build off the current VERA Core Physics Public Progression Problem specification, which has become a popular benchmark test suite for new methods development over the last few years

• TVA will release measured reactivity and flux map data for Cycles 1 and 2 to include in the benchmark problem

• Westinghouse fuel data will be approximate (based on Cycle 1 V5H design – already released)

• Draft specification planned in 2018• Possibility of extending to Cycle 5 in the future

Another opportunity for CASL to contribute to worldwide nuclear power industry

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