Abstract
As indicated in the two previous chapters, there are several features that combine to make a SFR system safe and reliable. Only when a major off-normal condition is encountered, combined with a postulated failure of the Plant Protective System (PPS), can serious accident consequences be predicted. Even then, it has been demonstrated that a properly designed SFR can survive unprotected transients without damage to the fuel or other barriers to radiation release.
With this background, it is useful to address accidents in three categories as follows:
Protected transients. An event initiator occurs, such as a component failure, failure of a safety grade system (other than the reactor PPS), or an external event, followed by activation of the plant protection system to shut down the reactor.
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Notes
- 1.
It is conceivable that inherent passive safety features can be classified as a passive alternate to the PPS and can therefore reduce the number of unprotected accidents that must be considered. Such events can be classified as “accommodated” transients as the plant and fuel system design features are adequate to mitigate the consequences of the event initiator without actuation of the PPS. Such classification is very specific to the plant and fuel system design, and is not addressed here.
- 2.
As noted later in this section, these phenomena are the key inherent reactivity feedback mechanisms to compensate for changes in core power and temperature during transient conditions. They are the primary mechanisms for reactivity control at the designers’ disposal when incorporating inherent passive safety features into SFR designs.
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Sackett, J. (2012). Unprotected Transients. In: Waltar, A., Todd, D., Tsvetkov, P. (eds) Fast Spectrum Reactors. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-9572-8_15
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