Validation of numerical solvers for liquid metal flow in a complex geometry in the presence of a strong magnetic field

Patel, Ankur; Pulugundla, Gautam; Smolentsev, S.; Abdou, Mohamed; Bhattacharyay, R.

doi:10.1007/s00162-017-0446-9

Cited by 16 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…The V&V procedure of the RELAP5 MHD module involves the comparison of the results deduced by the code with those of direct numerical simulation tools and data obtained by experimental works. Notable examples of V&V for MHD numerical solvers are found in References [46][47][48][49][50]. At first, simple test cases are employed to verify the response of the program in terms of magnetohydrodynamic pressure drops, either for 2D and 3D phenomena, thus testing the reproduction of a single MHD phenomenon separately.…”

Section: Verification and Validation (Vandv)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Development of a RELAP5/MOD3.3 Module for MHD Pressure Drop Analysis in Liquid Metals Loops: Verification and Validation

et al. 2021

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Magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) phenomena, due to the interaction between a magnetic field and a moving electro-conductive fluid, are crucial for the design of magnetic-confinement fusion reactors and, specifically, for the design of the breeding blanket concepts that adopt liquid metals (LMs) as working fluids. Computational tools are employed to lead fusion-relevant physical analysis, but a dedicated MHD code able to simulate all the phenomena involved in a blanket is still not available and there is a dearth of systems code featuring MHD modelling capabilities. In this paper, models to predict both 2D and 3D MHD pressure drop, derived by experimental and numerical works, have been implemented in the thermal-hydraulic system code RELAP5/MOD3.3 (RELAP5). The verification and validation procedure of the MHD module involves the comparison of the results obtained by the code with those of direct numerical simulation tools and data obtained by experimental works. As relevant examples, RELAP5 is used to recreate the results obtained by the analysis of two test blanket modules: Lithium Lead Ceramic Breeder and Helium-Cooled Lithium Lead. The novel MHD subroutines are proven reliable in the prediction of the pressure drop for both simple and complex geometries related to LM circuits at high magnetic field intensity (error range ±10%).

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Section: Verification and Validation (Vandv)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Development of a RELAP5/MOD3.3 Module for MHD Pressure Drop Analysis in Liquid Metals Loops: Verification and Validation

et al. 2021

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“…Five test cases were proposed, including MHD fully developed, 3D flows, and flows with heat transfer. In the framework of this campaign, several comparisons between the codes were performed recently [97,98] to qualify these codes as a potential design and analysis tool for blanket applications.…”

Section: Full Numerical Computationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There is a decent number of studies [62,[112][113][114][115][116][117][118][119] of prototypical manifold-like MHD flows that varied in flow geometry (flows with expansions or contractions, and with and without the parallel channels), wall electrical conductivity (electrically conducting versus insulating walls), magnetic field direction (geometry changes are either in the plane perpendicular or parallel to the magnetic field) and range of flow parameters (various Ha and Re numbers). Additionally, there are several studies for flows in a U-bend [97,[120][121][122][123]. In the full 3D computations, the Hartmann number was typically limited to several hundreds, rarely to a few thousands, while the Reynolds number was set at several thousands or less.…”

Section: Full Numerical Computationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Physical Background, Computations and Practical Issues of the Magnetohydrodynamic Pressure Drop in a Fusion Liquid Metal Blanket

Smolentsev

2021

Fluids

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In blankets of a fusion power reactor, liquid metal (LM) breeders, such as pure lithium or lead-lithium alloy, circulate in complex shape blanket conduits for power conversion and tritium breeding in the presence of a strong plasma-confining magnetic field. The interaction of the magnetic field with induced electric currents in the breeder results in various magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) effects on the flow. Of them, high MHD pressure losses in the LM breeder flows is one of the most important feasibility issues. To design new feasible LM breeding blankets or to improve the existing blanket concepts and designs, one needs to identify and characterize sources of high MHD pressure drop, to understand the underlying physics of MHD flows and to eventually define ways of mitigating high MHD pressure drop in the entire blanket and its sub-components. This article is a comprehensive review of earlier and recent studies of MHD pressure drop in LM blankets with a special focus on: (1) physics of LM MHD flows in typical blanket configurations, (2) development and testing of computational tools for LM MHD flows, (3) practical aspects associated with pumping of a conducting liquid breeder through a strong magnetic field, and (4) approaches to mitigation of the MHD pressure drop in a LM blanket.

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“…The coupling of energy equations such as (4) to the radial heat conduction within channel walls will generally require appropriate heat transfer coefficients enabling mean wall temperature, mean wall heat flux and bulk temperature to be related, similar to the non-MHD case. A key difference with the MHD cases considered here is that the heat transfer effects of the distorted flow profile and possibly inhomogeneous wall heating is insufficiently well characterized by an expression such as (3). For H 1 cases, the underlying assumption is that the wall thermal conductivity is very large such that there is negligible variation in the specified wall temperature T w around the periphery.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…The simulation of such flows and their related heat transfer processes is important for the realisation of viable fusion blanket designs. Detailed magnetohydrodynamic CFD is able, in principle, to simulate many of these processes, but at great computational expense [3,4]. As a result, the simulation by such means, of whole fusion blanket plant networks in a range of steady state and transient conditions is well beyond current and foreseeable computational capacity.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Analytical Solutions to Nonuniform Surface Heat Transfer With Volumetric Sources in Magnetohydrodynamic Duct Flow

Bluck

2019

Journal of Heat Transfer

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A detailed understanding of the flow of a liquid metal in a rectangular duct subject to a strong transverse magnetic field is vital in a number of engineering applications, notably for proposed blanket technologies for fusion reactors. Fusion reactors offer the potential for clean base-load energy and their development is now entering an engineering phase where the practical means by which the energy released can be converted into useful heat must be addressed. To such ends, this article considers the convective heat transfer processes for fully developed laminar magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) flows in rectangular ducts of the kind proposed in some blanket designs. Analytical solutions which incorporate the nonuniformity of peripheral temperature and heat flux and the effect of volumetric heating, are developed as functions of magnetic field strength and duct aspect ratio. A distinct feature of these MHD problems, not yet addressed in the literature, is that unlike the conventional characterization of heat transfer by a Nusselt number, it is necessary to generalize the concept to vectors and matrices of Nusselt coefficients, due to the extreme anisotropy of both the flow and heating. The new analytical results presented here capture more complex heat transfer behavior than non-MHD flows and in particular characterize the importance of aspect ratio. The importance of these new results lie not only in the improved understanding of this complex process but also in the provision of characterizations of convective heat transfer which underpin progress toward systems scale simulations of fusion blanket technology which will be vital for the realization of practical fusion reactors.

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Validation of numerical solvers for liquid metal flow in a complex geometry in the presence of a strong magnetic field

Cited by 16 publications

References 26 publications

Development of a RELAP5/MOD3.3 Module for MHD Pressure Drop Analysis in Liquid Metals Loops: Verification and Validation

Development of a RELAP5/MOD3.3 Module for MHD Pressure Drop Analysis in Liquid Metals Loops: Verification and Validation

Physical Background, Computations and Practical Issues of the Magnetohydrodynamic Pressure Drop in a Fusion Liquid Metal Blanket

Analytical Solutions to Nonuniform Surface Heat Transfer With Volumetric Sources in Magnetohydrodynamic Duct Flow

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