Multi-scale thermal engineering simulation on the inlet flow blockage accident of pressure tube embedded fuel component

Due to that no cross flow exists in pressure tube embedded plate-type fuel component, the flow blockage accidents are apt to occur under some conditions, i.e., irradiation swelling of fuel or fragments entering into the cooling channel. The accidents may deteriorate the cooling condition and result in the phenomenon of departuring from nucleate boiling. Considering the special flow characteristics of the long and curved paths in fusion-fission hybrid energy reactor blanket, a simulation method with multi-scale thermal model is proposed. The boundary conditions calculated by RELAP5 code are provided to computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code. The thermal characteristics of the fuel component which has the largest deposited power density under partial and total flow blockage accidents are simulated. The results indicate that the fuel temperature still meet thermal safety criterion when the single cooling channel partially blocked. The peak temperature of fuel component will exceed the limit of phase-transition temperature when totally blocked.