Flowing Refractometer for Feed Water State Control in the Second Loop of Nuclear Reactor

Abstract

The necessity to control the feed water state in the second loop of a nuclear power plant nuclear reactor is justified. The different methods of the state control of flowing water in the pipeline are reviewed. It has been established that controlling the feed water state should not result in irreversible changes in its chemical composition and physical structure. A change in the composition or structure of feed water leads to a change in its heat capacity. The heat transfer deteriorates, the production of electrical energy in the installation decreases, and the additional release of heat into the atmosphere increases. This process also occurs during the heat capacity changes for other reasons. The method for controlling the feed water heat capacity by measuring the value of the refractive index n is developed. The design of a flow-through refractometer based on the total internal reflection for control of the feed water state in the stream is made. The dependence of the heat capacity change of feed water from the refractive index is established. The results of research on different types of water are presented.

Functional refractive-index sensor by internal reflection of diffuse light

“…Critical angle refractometers such as the Abbe refractometers (see, for example, Gooch, 2006) and minimum deviation angle refractometers (Werner, 1968) are extensively used today. But different refractometers based on similar or other principles, such as interferometry (Ming-Horng et al , 1997; de Angelis et al , 2000), diffractometry (Lu et al , 2020), absorption (Huang et al , 2021), laser refraction (Moreels et al , 1984; Nemoto, 1992; Malardé et al , 2008) and near critical internal reflection can be found in the specialized literature (Tentori and Famozo, 1993; Ming-Horng et al , 1997; García-Valenzuela et al , 1998; Guo et al , 2019; Luo et al , 2019; Spyridon et al , 2021; Davydov et al , 2022). Many devices have been proposed and studied as RI sensors for rather specific applications.…”