Core-concrete interactions using molten urania with zirconium on a limestone concrete basemat

Abstract

An inductively heated experiment SURC-1, using U0,-Zr02 material, was executed to measure and assess the thermal, gas, and aerosol source terms produced during core debdconcrete interactions. The SURC-1 experiment eroded a total of 27 cm of limestone concrete during 130 minutes of sustained interaction using 204.2 kg of malten prototypic U02-Zr0, core debris material that included 18 kg of Zr metal and 3.4 kg of fission product simulants. The melt pool temperature ranged from 2100 to 2400°C during the first 50 minutes of the test, followed by steady temperatures of 2000 to 2100°C during the middle portion of the test and temperatures of 1800 to 2000°C during the final 50 minutes of testing. The total erosion during the first 50 minutes was 16 cm with an additional 2 cm during the middle part of the test and 9 cm of ablation during the final 50 minutes. Aerosols were continuously released in concentrations ranging from 30 to 200 g/m3. Comprehensive gas flow rates, gas compositions, and aerosol compositions were also measured during the SURC-1 test. ...

Development and verification of molten corium–concrete interaction code

“…Several numerical methods have been developed to simulate molten core concrete interaction and are used in safety studies to calculate the reactor cavity behavior during severe accident: CORCON (Bradley et al, 1993), COSACO (Nie et al, 2002), WECHSL (Reimann, 1987),TOLBIAC-ICB (Spindler et al, 2006) and ASTEC/MEDICIS . It is well known that the calculation results of one-dimensional concrete ablation model predict well with the experimental results of SWISS (Blose et al) and SURC (Copus et al, 1992) although the model cannot calculate the local ablation differences. And melt temperature history with time has been predicted exactly.…”

An assessment of the CORCON-MOD3 code. Part 1: Thermal-hydraulic calculations

“…According to the test scenario [49], interaction with concrete slug began at about 135.0 min when the surface thermocouple failed at the mid radius array. The test proceeded in four distinct stages as follows:…”

Estimate of radionuclide release characteristics into containment under severe accident conditions. Final report

“…These experiments include KfK BETA series tests [44]. Sustained Urania Concrete (SURC) tests [45,46] performed at Sandia National Laboratory, and the Advanced Containment Experiment (ACE) Program [47][48][49][50][51][52] conducted at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL).…”