Thermal-hydraulic analysis of a VVER-1000 core in MSLB conditions

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to analyze the ability of a VVER-1000 core and its control system to cope with a hypothetical main steam line break (MSLB) accident in case of multiple equipment failures. The study involves the use of advanced 3D core calculation models benchmarked and validated for reactivity accidents in preceding studies. A MSLB core boundary condition problem is solved on a coarse (nodal) mesh with the coupled COBAYA/CTF neutronic/thermal hydraulic codes. The core thermal-hydraulic boundary conditions are obtained from a preceding full-plant MSLB simulation. The assessment of the core safety parameters is supplemented by a fine-mesh (sub-channel) thermal-hydraulic analysis of the hottest assemblies with the CTF code using information from the 3D nodal COBAYA/CTF calculations. Thirteen variants of a pessimistic MSLB scenario are considered, each of them assuming a number of equipment failures aggravated by eight control rods stuck out of the core after scram at different locations in the overcooled sector. The results (within the limitations of the adopted modeling assumptions) show that the core safety parameters do not exceed the safety limits in the simulated aggravated reactivity accidents.