Abstract
China has proposed several concepts of breeder blanket for future fusion reactor, one of which is the helium-cooled pebble bed (HCPB) blanket. HCPB blanket is a cellular design with solid breeder units (BUs) and other structural components to achieve its functional requirements. BU of the HCPB blanket consists of lithium ceramic breeders and beryllium pebble beds separated by cooling plates (CPs). Thermal–hydraulic analyses using ANSYS CFX have been done to measure the thermal performance of the designed BUs. The temperature distribution in structural and functional materials is obtained and cooling optimization is proposed according to the computational results. Results of BU cooling optimization indicate that the bed temperature is high enough to realize a good tritium release and extraction environment meanwhile maximum temperatures of different materials meet their thermal limits well. Details of BU thermal hydraulic analysis and cooling optimization are presented in this paper.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
M.-Y. Ahn, D.Y. Ku, S. Cho, I.-K. Yu, Thermo-hydraulic and thermo-mechanical analysis of Korean helium cooled solid breeder TBM. Fusion Eng. Des. 85, 1664–1669 (2010)
F. Cismondi, B. Kiss, F. Hernandez et al., The fundamental role of fluid dynamic analyses in the design of the solid EU Test Blanket Module. Fusion Eng Des. 87, 1123–1129 (2012)
Z. Xu, S. Hermsmeyer, Thermal–hydraulic analysis and optimization of breeder unit for EU heliumcooled pebble bed blanket. Fusion Eng Des. 75–79, 785–788 (2005)
P. Chaudhuri, C. Danani, E. Rajendra Kumar, V. Chaudhari, Overview of design and thermal–hydraulic analysis of Indian solid breeder blanket concept. Fusion Eng. Des. 87, 1111–1117 (2012)
C. Chen, S. Qi, H. Tang, M. Lei, Y. Song, Design, analysis and optimization of the first wall cooling system of the CFETR blanket. J Fusion Energ. 33, 535–539 (2014)
F. Hernandez, F. Cismondi, B. Kiss, Thermo-mechanical analyses and assessment with respect to the design codes and standards of the HCPB-TBM Breeder Unit. Fusion Eng Des. 86, 2278–2281 (2011)
C.-J. Xiao, X.-J. Chen, C.M. Kang et al., Out-of pile tritium release experiments of lithium orthosilicate pebbles. Nucl. Fusion Plasma Phys. 31, 224–227 (2011)
C. Xiao, C. Kang, X. Chen et al., Improvement of hydrogen isotope exchange reactions on Li4SiO4 ceramic pebble by catalytic metals. Chin. Chem. Lett. 23, 936–940 (2012)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Qi, S., Wang, G., Chen, C. et al. Thermal–Hydraulic Analysis and Optimization of HCPB Breeder Unit for Future Fusion Reactor. J Fusion Energ 34, 122–126 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10894-014-9768-4
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10894-014-9768-4