ML18340A016
| ML18340A016 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 11/16/2018 |
| From: | Weidong Wang Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards |
| To: | |
| Wang W | |
| References | |
| NRC-3985 | |
| Download: ML18340A016 (423) | |
Text
Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Title:
Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards Thermal-Hydraulic Phenomena Subcommittee Docket Number: (n/a)
Location: Rockville, Maryland Date: Friday, November 16, 2018 Work Order No.: NRC-3985 Pages 1-423 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
1 1
2 3
4 DISCLAIMER 5
6 7 UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSIONS 8 ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS 9
10 11 The contents of this transcript of the 12 proceeding of the United States Nuclear Regulatory 13 Commission Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards, 14 as reported herein, is a record of the discussions 15 recorded at the meeting.
16 17 This transcript has not been reviewed, 18 corrected, and edited, and it may contain 19 inaccuracies.
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1 1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3 + + + + +
4 ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON REACTOR SAFEGUARDS 5 (ACRS) 6 + + + + +
7 THERMAL-HYDRAULIC PHENOMENA SUBCOMMITTEE 8 + + + + +
9 OPEN SESSION 10 + + + + +
11 FRIDAY 12 NOVEMBER 16, 2018 13 + + + + +
14 ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND 15 + + + + +
16 The Subcommittee met at the Nuclear 17 Regulatory Commission, Three White Flint North, Rooms 18 1C03, 1C04 and 1C05, 11601 Landsdown Street, North 19 Bethesda, Maryland, at 8:30 a.m., Michael Corradini, 20 Chairman, presiding.
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2 1 COMMITTEE MEMBERS:
2 MICHAEL CORRADINI, Chairman 3 RONALD G. BALLINGER, Member 4 DENNIS BLEY, Member*
5 WALTER L. KIRCHNER, Member 6 JOSE A. MARCH-LEUBA, Member 7 JOY REMPE, Member 8 MATTHEW W. SUNSERI, Member 9
10 ACRS CONSULTANT:
11 STEPHEN SCHULTZ 12 13 DESIGNATED FEDERAL OFFICIAL:
14 WEIDONG WANG 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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3 1 ALSO PRESENT:
2 JOHN BOLIN, Public Participant 3 ALLYSON CALLAWAY, NuScale*
4 AMY CUBBAGE, NRO 5 JACOB DeWITTE, OKLO 6 RANDY GAUNTT, Sandia National Laboratories 7 MIRELA GAVRILAS, NRR 8 BRANDON HAUGH, Kairos Power 9 DON HELTON, NRR 10 ZESES KAROUTAS, Westinghouse 11 ANDREW LINGENFELTER, NuScale*
12 JOHN MONNINGER, NRO 13 ROBERT OELRICH, JR., Westinghouse 14 JOSHUA PARKER, Framatome 15 IAN PORTER, RES 16 ANDREW PROFFITT, NRR 17 EVERETT REDMOND, NEI 18 MARTIN VAN SKADEN, X-Energy 19 NICHOLAS SMITH, Southern Company/MSR 20 JEFF WHITT, Framatome*
21 22 *Present via telephone 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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4 1 A G E N D A 2 Opening Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 3 Introductions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 4
Background:
The Role of Computer Codes in 5 Regulatory Decisions . . . . . . . . . . . 11 6 Non-Light Water Reactor Confirmatory Codes . . . 33 7 Accident Tolerant Fuel (ATF) Confirmatory Codes . 64 8 Introduction to Kairos Power FHR Design . . . . . 92 9 Current Codes Selected for the Modeling of 10 Licensing Basis Events (LBEs) 11 Ongoing and Future Development and Testing 12 to Prepare the Codes for Licensing 13 Interactions 14 Application of Codes to ATF . . . . . . . . . . 117 15 Modeling and Simulation Plans for Companies 16 Represented in the Molten Salt Reactor (MSR) 17 Technology Working Group . . . . . . . . 140 18 Application of DOE Codes to Aid Near- and 19 Long-Term ATF Concepts and Advanced 20 Reactor Development . . . . . . . . . . . 174 21 Xe-100 Pebble Reactor Modeling and Simulation 22 Road Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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5 1 NuScale Interactions with CASL To Date and 2 Observations on Beneficial Next Step 3 for CASL Endeavors (Teleconference) . . . 215 4 Fast Reactor Modeling and Simulation . . . . . 217 5 Public Comments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263 6 Subcommittee Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . 266 7 Adjournment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282 8
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6 1 P R O C E E D I N G S 2 8:30 a.m.
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay. So, let's get 4 started, then. So, this is a meeting of the Thermal-5 Hydraulic Phenomena Subcommittee of the ACRS.
6 My name is Mike Corradini, Chairman of 7 today's Subcommittee meeting. ACRS members in 8 attendance are Ron Ballinger, Jose March-Leuba, Matt 9 Sunseri, Joy Rempe, and our consultant -- oh, I'm 10 sorry, and Walt Kirchner, he just arrived. And our 11 consultant Steve Schultz. Weidong Wang of the ACRS 12 staff is the Designated Federal Official for today's 13 meeting.
14 During today's meeting, the Subcommittee 15 will receive information briefings on computer codes, 16 with a focus on their use in light-water reactor 17 accident safety analyses for accident-tolerant fuels 18 and advanced reactors.
19 We appreciate the NRC staff's and external 20 presenters' willingness to come to brief the 21 Subcommittee.
22 Let me just go off script a bit, I want to 23 emphasize how appreciative we are. This all started 24 with a question we got from the Commission relative to 25 the use of advanced codes in safety analysis and we NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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7 1 appreciate the time and energy that both DOE, the 2 industry, and the NRC staff has put into trying to 3 brief us, so that we can potentially respond back to 4 the Commission.
5 The information will certainly be useful 6 as the ACRS prepares its review of regulatory actions 7 associated with ATF in light-water reactors and 8 advanced reactor designs, in terms of safety analyses.
9 Today's meeting is open to the public, 10 unless we need to close the session in order to 11 discuss and protect information that is proprietary, 12 pursuant to 5 USC 552(b)(4).
13 I will note that we have been told by all 14 the presenters there is nothing proprietary. We do 15 have two 30-minute breaks, just in case we get into 16 proprietary and want to get back to a question. It'll 17 be a bit confusing, because we may have to excuse some 18 people out of the room.
19 So, at this point, I don't expect any 20 proprietary information. And I'll try to keep the 21 Committee on task. If we delve into things like that, 22 you can let us know and we can potentially deal with 23 it in a different manner.
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8 1 of non-public information.
2 The ACRS was established by statute and is 3 governed by the Federal Advisory Committee Act, or 4 FACA. This means the Committee can only speak through 5 its published letter reports. We hold meetings to 6 gather information to support our deliberations.
7 What this really means is that the 8 comments and questions conveyed during the meetings 9 represent individual members' perspectives and not 10 positions of the ACRS.
11 The ACRS section of the US NRC public 12 website provides our charter, bylaws, letter reports, 13 and transcripts of the meetings open to the public, 14 including the slides presented at the open meetings.
15 The rules for participation at today's 16 meeting were previously announced in the Federal 17 Register. Interested parties who wish to provide 18 comments can contact our office requesting time.
19 At this point, we've received no written 20 comments, but we have requests for time to make oral 21 statements from members of the public regarding 22 today's meeting, at the end of the meeting.
23 That said, we also set a time for 24 extemporaneous comments from members of the public 25 attending or listening to our meetings. Written NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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9 1 comments are also welcome.
2 As mentioned, we have a bridge line 3 established for interested members listening in.
4 Parenthetically, apparently, nobody is listening just 5 let.
6 To preclude interruption of the meeting, 7 the phone bridge line will be placed in a listen mode 8 and muted for Committee discussions. We will unmute 9 the bridge line at the designated time in accordance 10 with a published agenda to afford the public an 11 opportunity to make statements or provide comments.
12 A transcript of today's meeting is being 13 kept. Therefore, we request that participants in this 14 meeting use the microphones located in the meeting 15 room when addressing the Subcommittee.
16 The speakers should first identify 17 themselves and speak with sufficient clarity and 18 volume so they be readily heard.
19 At this time, I'd ask that you silence all 20 various appliances, phones, whatever, so there's no 21 beeping and bopping going on during the meeting.
22 We'll now proceed with the meeting. John 23 Monninger of the Office of New Reactors will start us 24 in today's presentation. John?
25 MR. MONNINGER: Thank you, Dr. Corradini.
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10 1 My name is John Monninger. I'm the Director of Safety 2 Systems Risk Assessment in Advanced Reactors in NRC's 3 Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation.
4 The meeting today is a follow-up to the 5 meeting that the ACRS Subcommittee had back on August 6 21, focused on, at that time, discussions with the 7 Department of Energy on potential codes for accident-8 tolerant fuels and non-light water reactors.
9 My discussion, I'll cover two different 10 areas, Section 3 and 4 on the agenda. Section 3 on 11 the agenda, the role of computer codes in regulatory 12 discussions is really intended to provide a broader 13 perspective from the Agency on the use of codes.
14 It's not specific to NRO, it's intended to 15 represent the practices of NRR, NMSS, the Agency in 16 general and how we use codes in regulatory decisions.
17 And then, the second session will dive 18 into non-light water reactors, or advanced reactors, 19 which I'll use the term interchangeably there.
20 With that said, from the staff's 21 perspective, in particular for non-light water 22 reactors, we see this as a beginning of a series of 23 discussions with the ACRS.
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11 1 Regulatory Research and we're working very closely 2 with Research, coming up with our plans.
3 So, if I could have the next slide, which 4 is just the introduction section on NRC use of 5 computer codes in general?
6 So, if you look at this slide, here, there 7 are various codes that the NRC has developed and 8 sponsored over the years. This slide doesn't list 9 them all, but it covers representative examples of 10 them.
11 And generally, they've been focused, with 12 the staff's practice or focus being on existing light 13 water reactors or large light water reactors. So, 14 some of these codes are also used within the Office of 15 Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards.
16 But they cover a wide range of areas, be 17 it fuel performance, reactor systems analysis, 18 consequence analysis, radiation protection, chemical 19 gases impacting the Control Room, et cetera.
20 They are used for an assessment of normal 21 operations, off-normal operations, anticipated 22 operational occurrences, design-basis accidents, 23 beyond-design-basis accidents, and severe accidents.
24 So, there's a pretty healthy set of NRC-25 sponsored codes out there. And these codes are NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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12 1 maintained by our Office of Nuclear Regulatory 2 Research, in support of work done by the licensing 3 organizations.
4 So, if I could have the next slide, 5 please?
6 So, I think there's a lot, a lot of 7 discussion with regards to confirmatory analysis and 8 what is the NRC going to do about confirmatory 9 analysis? But I think you have to step back a little 10 bit and say the codes uses are much broader than just 11 confirmatory analysis.
12 And if you think about analysis, who has 13 the burden of responsibility? So, in certain areas, 14 in regulatory practice, NRC bears the brunt of the 15 burden of responsibility, improving what we want to 16 do. In other areas, the licensees and the applicants 17 do.
18 So, if you think about the NRC, areas that 19 we are primarily accountable for that burden of proof 20 is in our rulemakings, it's in our guidance 21 developments, it's in plant-specific orders, generic 22 orders, backfit analysis, regulatory analysis, generic 23 safety studies, for example, the SOARCA study that the 24 Agency did, the reactor oversight process.
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13 1 a site and we decide to proceed with a performance 2 deficiency, a white finding, a green findings, a 3 yellow finding, a red finding, the burden on proof 4 there is with the NRC, through our SPAR models, 5 through our other analysis, to demonstrate -- we have 6 the burden of proof to demonstrate the significance of 7 that finding.
8 In a similar manner, in support of 9 rulemakings. If we did -- if you go back to the 10 efforts underway post-Fukushima, potential rulemakings 11 on water addition, potential rulemakings on filter 12 vents, the burden of proof there was on the staff to 13 do the analysis.
14 And we use NRC's analytical codes to 15 support all these areas on the left. In addition to 16 that, we also use the codes for confirmatory analysis 17 and supporting review on an application or an 18 amendment.
19 But the primary responsibility, when it 20 comes to the applications and amendments, the burden 21 of proof then rests with the licensee, their 22 analytical models.
23 We will use NRC analytical models for 24 confirmatory analysis, but the burden of proof is with 25 the applicants and the licensees.
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14 1 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: John, can I stop you 2 there? Because I --
3 MR. MONNINGER: Yes, sir.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- think I know where 5 you're going, which I think is a good overview. But 6 it doesn't preclude that the licensee or the NRC might 7 choose to use the same evaluation model --
8 MR. MONNINGER: Correct.
9 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- it's then the 10 user's burden to show that they are intelligent, 11 excuse my words here, intelligent enough to use the 12 evaluation model appropriately, with the appropriate 13 assumptions, inputs, et cetera, et cetera?
14 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
15 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
16 MR. MONNINGER: Yes, sir.
17 MEMBER REMPE: So, since you're 18 interrupted, I know why you've made this list on the 19 left, because you're talking about an application, but 20 there's another responsibility of the regulator, and 21 that's if you have yet another accident has occurred 22 over the years.
23 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
24 MEMBER REMPE: And if one does go with the 25 tools of the applicant for a unique new type of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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15 1 concept, what will be the backup?
2 I mean, we heard at the last meeting, oh, 3 yes, DOE is going to maintain ownership of the 4 software itself. The regulator needs to be ready in 5 case of something happening, and how does that fit 6 into what you've got here?
7 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. So, and I'm not fully 8 appreciating probably the question, whether it's in 9 the direct emergency response, the codes we may use in 10 the Ops Center, or whether it's in a fact-finding or 11 a lessons learned subsequent to an event?
12 MEMBER REMPE: Both of those things, but 13 especially during the initial response actions that 14 have to be taken, the regulator needs to give wise 15 advice.
16 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. So, even today, for 17 large light water reactors, NRC, in the assessment, we 18 have some -- I'm the Director of NRC's -- I'm one of 19 NRC's -- one of the positions I fill is the Director 20 of the Reactor Safety Team.
21 And there's four or five or six of us, 22 dependent upon when the event would potentially occur 23 and who can respond first. I've had that position for 24 probably the past 15 years and prior to that, I was a 25 Severe Accident Analyst on the Reactor Safety Team, et NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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16 1 cetera.
2 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I think we're trying 3 to reconnect, sorry, I apologize.
4 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
5 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, keep going ahead.
6 MR. MONNINGER: So, with that said, you 7 have to recognize, within the Ops Centers, the events 8 go pretty quickly. So, the notion that the NRC, in 9 the midst of an event, is doing detailed analysis, 10 isn't there.
11 We have some simplified tools, and there 12 are RASCAL calculations that are done, but given the 13 progression of events, in the midst, it doesn't occur 14 in the midst of events. There are --
15 MEMBER REMPE: Some of these unique designs 16 are going to be so slow as they --
17 (Laughter.)
18 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
19 MEMBER REMPE: Lots of time. But I just --
20 again, you need to keep in mind --
21 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
22 MEMBER REMPE: -- that you've got to be 23 prepared, as a regulator, for the unexpected, to give 24 wise advice on --
25 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
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17 1 MEMBER REMPE: -- what needs to be done.
2 And I hope that's being considered and factored in.
3 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. And I would -- so, I 4 think part of our framework in proceeding, assuming an 5 application comes in and is eventually granted and 6 licensed, would be to ensure that our entire 7 regulatory infrastructure, including the Ops Center, 8 is prepared to deal with any potential upset of 9 conditions.
10 And so, I think it is a fair point here, 11 that I didn't list that, but it does make sense that 12 our infrastructure for the Ops Center would need to 13 appropriately be expanded also to cover non-light 14 water reactors.
15 So, I put the green box there, the 16 confirmatory analysis, when it does come to that legal 17 finding, there's limited role in the actual legal 18 finding of NRC's confirmatory analysis.
19 It's a very wonderful tool to focus the 20 staff on areas of importance. It's a wonderful tool 21 to provide additional confidence in the licensing 22 analysis and the licensing model, but in the end, the 23 decision that the NRC makes on granting a license is 24 the licensee's model and approach.
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18 1 forward. They carry forward to day one in operation, 2 day ten years, day 40 years, license renewal, 3 subsequent renewal.
4 NRC confirmatory calculations don't carry 5 forward. I mean, a question, could -- in support of 6 ABWRs, so I was involved in the design certification 7 review of ABWR, could the NRC recall any confirmatory 8 analysis that we did for the ABWR?
9 And there's the potential we could, but 10 that's not required in the Agency. However, for GE, 11 they need to maintain those models. Post-licensing, 12 it is based upon the applicant.
13 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: John? It's true that 14 the staff confirmatory calculation has no legal 15 standing --
16 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
17 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: -- correct?
18 MR. MONNINGER: Yes, sir.
19 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: However, the reason we 20 perform confirmatory calculations, in my opinion, the 21 primary value of it is to find out what mechanism the 22 licensee forgot.
23 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
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19 1 model?
2 MR. MONNINGER: Yes, sir.
3 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: And that, even though 4 has no legal standing whatsoever --
5 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
6 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: -- it has tremendous 7 value in the review. That's why we do it.
8 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. And I fully agree 9 with you and that's a great segue to the next slide.
10 And that would be the second bullet there, as to why 11 we do it, it's to facilitate an effective and 12 efficient review.
13 For the staff to focus on those areas of 14 the application where there is the potential that the 15 applicant's analysis isn't as robust, what are the 16 areas of the application that are important to safety, 17 what are the areas of the application that are risk-18 significant, where should the staff's line of 19 questioning go through, where should the staff do 20 audits, et cetera.
21 So, it's to do exactly what you're saying, 22 and my thought is, that gives us an effective and 23 efficient review, it focuses --
24 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: I think your third 25 bullet, first bullet of the third bullet, says it all.
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20 1 If we are reviewing a calculation for which we've seen 2 150 the last three months --
3 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
4 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: -- we don't need to do 5 confirmatory, we're already experts on that.
6 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
7 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: But whenever you're 8 doing a new type of transient or reactor or mechanism 9 --
10 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
11 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: -- then, the fact that 12 we're doing the confirmatory calculation, we are 13 making experts out of our staff.
14 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
15 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: And they're learning 16 what's important for the review.
17 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. And as you mentioned, 18 experts are just for knowledge management or for 19 training, as you mentioned. And then, first-of-a-kind 20 operations, design features, et cetera, to focus the 21 review, is really why we do do the confirmatory 22 analysis.
23 The confirmatory analysis, there can be 24 the view out there that it's the double-ended 25 guillotine break for a LOCA, for ECCS analysis, for NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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21 1 peak-containment design pressures.
2 And at times, we do do that, but in terms 3 of the licensing staff, what we find to be potentially 4 of more value isn't that one broad in-depth analysis 5 of a particular accident sequence that the applicant 6 did.
7 Rather, it's having a tool sitting next to 8 the licensing reviewer or up in the Office of 9 Research, where we can ask ourselves what if 10 questions, what if questions, to determine then 11 whether we need to engage the applicant.
12 So, I call these sort of mini, they're not 13 really sensitivity studies, but you want a tool by 14 your side so you can ask what is the impact of 15 variation of a parameter, to know whether you need to 16 engage the applicant.
17 So, there are the full-blown analyses, but 18 then, there's these mini-tools that we use on the 19 side.
20 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: If you ask me to 21 convince somebody in management that that's valuable, 22 I would have focused it on training the staff on 23 what's important for this review.
24 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
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22 1 the staff an expert and maybe he wasn't an expert, 2 nobody was an expert on this particular event.
3 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. And I would say, in 4 terms of management support, interest, endorsement of 5 ensuring we're ready, in terms of the codes, be it 6 changes or modifications to NRC codes, or let me call 7 it NRC-sponsored codes or DOE-sponsored codes, that 8 support is currently there.
9 MR. SCHULTZ: John, of these examples, for 10 the topics we're going to be discussing today, the 11 first and the fourth element, first-of-a-kind and 12 then, the opportunity to gain insights for those areas 13 of application, those seem like the most important 14 features.
15 We're bound to have -- we would hope to 16 have fairly large safety margins, as we move forward 17 --
18 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
19 MR. SCHULTZ: -- in these concepts. And of 20 course, effective use of resources, okay.
21 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
22 MR. SCHULTZ: But it's really the first and 23 fourth element that we would focus on.
24 MR. MONNINGER: Yes, for non-light water 25 reactors. And this first discussion was meant to be NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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23 1 broader --
2 MR. SCHULTZ: Understood --
3 MR. MONNINGER: -- Agency-wide. So, the 4 next slide.
5 In doing the confirmatory analysis -- so, 6 last night, I corrected most of the slides, as opposed 7 to saying NRC codes and DOE code, it should be NRC-8 sponsored codes versus DOE-sponsored codes.
9 Because in the end, the vast majority of 10 the codes, be it NRC-sponsored codes or DOE-sponsored 11 codes, are being performed by the National Labs. So, 12 the notion that it's an NRC code versus a DOE code, 13 it's more in terms of the direction and the 14 sponsorship of it.
15 So, we can use various codes out there to 16 conduct the confirmatory analysis. And one thing that 17 has been very beneficial for the staff is even having 18 the applicant's code to be able to run.
19 For the NuScale application, we found that 20 to be of significant value, to be able to exercise 21 their code.
22 MEMBER REMPE: And again, when you use 23 this, there's, embedded into that first bullet, the 24 fact that all of the codes should be validated with 25 appropriate data?
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24 1 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
2 MEMBER REMPE: Okay.
3 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Since she brought it 5 up, and you can postpone us, because I'm going to be 6 pretty strict about time, because we have so many 7 speakers today.
8 Somewhere today, or later, I think it's 9 got to be clearly identified, as Joy mentioned, that 10 if we're going to choose Tool X, that there's a 11 pedigree to Tool X, such that either the applicant 12 show the pedigree, so we're clear about the validation 13 of it relative to experiments or, we'll call it more 14 conservative analyses or something, or the staff, if 15 they're going to use it as their evaluation tool, have 16 got to feel comfortable.
17 So, somewhere, maybe not today, I assume 18 in the NRC program plan, there will be that element.
19 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. And the intent is, 20 today would be the beginning of a series of 21 discussions. And we do intend to come back to the 22 ACRS with the staff's joint recommendations from the 23 Office of Research and the NRR as to where we would 24 like to proceed and what's the basis for that, et 25 cetera.
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25 1 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: All right, thank you.
2 MR. MONNINGER: I think we covered the 3 second one. So, and then, the last bullet there. So, 4 NRC-initiated analysis, other than confirmatory 5 analysis, even though the code is on confirmatory 6 analysis.
7 So, this is intended to go back to the 8 bullets on the previous slide, in terms of analysis we 9 may do in support of rulemaking, backfit analysis, et 10 cetera.
11 In those cases, we will come to the ACRS 12 for formal -- many times, we will come to the ACRS for 13 formal review of our analysis in support of that, be 14 it our computer analysis, et cetera.
15 In terms of the staff's actual 16 confirmatory analysis, when ACRS reviews an 17 application, it is focused, it's mostly focused on the 18 applicant's analysis and the staff's analysis is 19 discussed in there.
20 However, when we come to proceed with a 21 rulemaking, proceed with a generic safety issue, 22 proceed with a SOARCA study, et cetera, the peer 23 review and comment is on the staff's analysis.
24 We aren't presenting, when we come in to 25 support a license application, we aren't putting in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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26 1 front of the ACRS the staff's confirmatory analysis 2 for licensing decision, in terms of a peer review, in 3 a similar manner that we would in support of a 4 rulemaking, a backfit analysis, et cetera.
5 Rolling on, some various -- we have our 6 SRP, Standard Review Plan, 0800. Of course, we would 7 need different types of guidance for non-light water 8 reactors.
9 In certain sections, it discusses the 10 potential need for confirmatory analysis. Sometimes 11 it calls it independent analysis, independent 12 verification. We use different types of terminology.
13 And, there, it is, once again, to confirm 14 the predictions, but in the end, it's to confirm what 15 the applicant did.
16 And also, it's not required of the staff 17 to do, it's optional, and it's based upon their 18 insights of the design and discussions with their 19 supervisor. Next slide.
20 So, broadly, we tried to pick some 21 representative light water reactor areas where 22 applicants depend upon modeling and simulation tools, 23 computer codes, computational analysis, and to tie it 24 to the regulatory requirements and then, to tie it to, 25 be it the reactor design or the engineered safety NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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27 1 features or support systems.
2 In many of these areas, dependent upon the 3 particular design, the staff will do or will consider 4 doing confirmatory analysis.
5 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: This is an interesting 6 graphic. I guess, my first reaction is, when you have 7 a conversation with an applicant, is it clear what 8 they're going to use in all these little boxes?
9 Because --
10 MR. MONNINGER: So, some applicants --
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- I was going to ask 12 the applicants later today, do they have this 13 graphical map like this for their various advanced 14 reactors?
15 Because it seems to me, that, assuming 16 it's not a proprietary issue that I can't talk about 17 today --
18 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
19 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- but to me, this 20 sort of mapping actually is pretty illustrative of 21 what you need or what they need to do to make sure 22 they're clear on their plan.
23 MR. MONNINGER: So, some applicants, and 24 we're not talking about non-light water reactors --
25 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Yes.
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28 1 MR. MONNINGER: -- just historically over 2 the past 20 years, the level of engagement of various 3 developers, designers, ranges across the spectrum.
4 Some applicants are in with the NRC 5 multiple years in pre-application meetings. They talk 6 about their proposed testing regimes, they talk about 7 the potential codes, they talk about the validations 8 of the codes.
9 Others, there's much, much more limited 10 discussions, in terms of what their intent is. So, it 11 really does run the spectrum.
12 With that said, there is no requirement 13 for them to come in. But in terms of providing more 14 certainty that the staff is prepared for the 15 application, those pre-application discussions are 16 definitely beneficial.
17 MEMBER REMPE: We heard about the 18 regulatory engagement plans that the staff is 19 encouraging these developers to provide. And is that 20 one of the things you're suggesting be included in the 21 regulatory engagement plans?
22 MR. MONNINGER: So, we don't have a chart 23 or a figure like this, however, if an applicant would 24 like to discuss their analytical codes, to have the 25 NRC provide some level of feedback to that, they could NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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29 1 develop a regulatory engagement plan for just that 2 small, specific purpose.
3 Or they could develop a regulatory 4 engagement plan much broader, to cover all pre-5 application type activities.
6 So, one of the potential designs has 7 submitted a report on their approach to models and 8 reactor analysis and the staff has been involved in 9 discussions with one design out there. Next slide, 10 please.
11 So, takeaways, for a summary slide or a 12 conclusion. Codes are much broader than licensing 13 confirmatory analysis. We have other responsibilities 14 to support solid rulemakings, et cetera.
15 The scope and the tools varies widely.
16 The third bullet is just, again, a reinforcement that 17 in the end, the granting of a license and the codes 18 and the methodologies and approaches that carry 19 forward the applicant's.
20 And we do do, in support of licensing, the 21 confirmatory analysis, to support an effective and 22 efficient review.
23 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Nobody has said this 24 before, but this is a Subcommittee meeting, so what 25 you're hearing is individual member's comments.
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30 1 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, you can ignore 2 his.
3 (Laughter.)
4 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: I was -- this is not 5 the ACRS speaking. I was left in charge of the 6 minutiae and other annoying comments by John Stetkar 7 when he retired.
8 So, on that sense, I see, in mathematical 9 terms, there's a forcing function from management or 10 NRC that is driving to making reviews shorter and 11 cheaper.
12 And that forcing function is driving the 13 solution towards minimizing the number of confirmatory 14 calculations. I mean, you would agree that that is 15 the case?
16 MR. MONNINGER: So, I don't think -- so, 17 that's leading the witness, I would agree.
18 (Laughter.)
19 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: That's a perfect 20 analogy.
21 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. But I wouldn't agree 22 with that. I think, so I'm within the Office of New 23 Reactors and NRR has challenges, NMSS has challenges 24 also with schedules. So, I think it's important for 25 us to make timely decisions and to be predictable.
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31 1 Our reviews of the advanced light water 2 reactor designs, the AP600, the amendment to it, 3 ESBWR, I think it is generally recognized that the 4 time period it took those to be completed was well in 5 excess of what it should be.
6 So, we did put a challenge to ourselves, 7 for the KHNP APR1400 application to complete it within 8 42 months. But 42 months is also a long time, it's 9 three and a half years.
10 So, there's time and then, there's 11 resources out there. So, there's time and there's 12 resources, as many resources as was needed to the KHNP 13 application was applied. And where needed, we did do 14 confirmatory calculations, recognizing that, to a 15 large extent, it was an enhanced System 80+ design out 16 there.
17 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: I'll 100 percent agree 18 with you that we need to shorten the reviews --
19 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
20 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: -- and make them more 21 predictable.
22 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
23 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Especially more 24 predictable.
25 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
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32 1 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: It should not be 2 rolling the dice. But with that in mind, I just 3 wanted to defend the confirmatory, because I've worked 4 on that and I like doing this.
5 I see two sources of value. One of them, 6 you emphasized, which is the training of the staff.
7 By forcing the staff to perform the calculations 8 themselves, they know what the problems are with the 9 calculations.
10 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
11 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: The other one, that 12 you have not addressed, is it performs kind of a check 13 on the uncertainty of the calculation.
14 By doing a completely independent 15 calculation, and whether you get the number in the 16 same order of magnitude or not, tells you what the 17 uncertainty on the calculation is.
18 If you come up with a factor of two, 19 suddenly you have to decide whether a factor of two is 20 acceptable or not.
21 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
22 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: So, don't 23 underestimate the value of the estimate of the 24 uncertainty on the confirmatory calculations.
25 MR. MONNINGER: Okay.
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33 1 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: And finally, I mean, 2 I would like for us to continue to do confirmatory 3 calculation, we just have to be smart on how we do 4 that and how many we do.
5 If we already have staff that is familiar 6 with LOCA and what all the pitfalls with a LOCA 7 calculation, maybe we don't need to run a LOCA 8 confirmatory, unless we're looking for the uncertainty 9 on the calculation.
10 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. So, I agree with you.
11 And I do have a slide, and we're going to roll into 12 the non-light water reactors, and you may want to 13 bring up the question again on schedule then, because 14 I do put a challenge out there on non-light water 15 reactors and schedules and confirmatory analysis.
16 So, the next discussion and the next 17 slide. So, you're familiar with the NRC's Vision and 18 Strategy, was issued in December of 2016, and we had 19 several meetings with the ACRS on that.
20 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: It's only been two 21 weeks ago, so in theory, we remember.
22 (Laughter.)
23 MR. MONNINGER: Well, not --
24 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: October 30 is when we 25 had our last one on the LMP.
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34 1 MR. MONNINGER: On the LMP, yes. Yes. And 2 then, supporting that is the IAPs, the near-term. And 3 within Strategy 2 is the plans to develop computer 4 codes and review tools.
5 And that's what we're discussing today, 6 our planning efforts for computer codes and review 7 tools. The next slide just provides some of the 8 discussion within the vision of the strategy.
9 And it was clearly stated, even back then, 10 when we issued it in December of 2016, our intent is 11 to leverage the experience from Department of Energy, 12 international, academia, et cetera, in various areas.
13 Our intent here is to say, we are not 14 fixated on just proceeding with NRC-sponsored codes of 15 the past.
16 If there's a better way to do things, that 17 achieves NRC's mission and can be done so in a cost-18 effective manner, we will use other codes out there, 19 be it DOE-sponsored codes from NEAMS, CASL, or any 20 other place.
21 And that's the IAP, our initial efforts 22 are focused on evaluation of the potential codes out 23 there and potentially down-selecting the codes that 24 the staff would consider. And they'll be the 25 discussions we'll have with the ACRS in the future.
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35 1 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: The way you phrase it, 2 though, John, it strikes me that this is a 3 conversation that's still in the midst of being had 4 within the staff.
5 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. So, there's actually 6 some very engaged discussions.
7 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Well, I've always 8 known the staff to be very engaged.
9 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. So, I think it's 10 actually good, I think it's very good for our staff, 11 for the staff from the Office of Research to be very 12 interested in the topic and to be engaged.
13 Because what we want to do is we want to 14 ensure -- first off, we want to make sure we're ready.
15 Congress, the administration, the Commission, they've 16 given us the charge to be ready.
17 In addition to that, they've given us the 18 funding. And it's not very often that Congress 19 provides earmarked funding to the NRC to be ready.
20 So, we want to do both those things.
21 So, the Office of Research and our staff 22 are working very closely together on this. And once 23 we're aligned, we'll come in with our draft 24 recommendations to the ACRS.
25 So, even though a couple weeks ago, on the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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36 1 LMP, when we originally rolled out the Vision and 2 Strategy and the IAPs to the ACRS, it was early 2017.
3 The ACRS wrote a letter, basically said, the most bang 4 for the buck is on Strategies 3 and 5.
5 Strategy 3 being the flexible review 6 processes, the LMP, the ARDC, the Advanced Reactor 7 Design Criteria, that were originally -- the work on 8 that originally sponsored by the Department of Energy, 9 and also on the resolution of policy issues, such as 10 emergency planning, such as security, such as siting, 11 et cetera. So, that's where the vast -- a lot of our 12 effort has been focused.
13 With that said, if you look at the 14 potential resources to work on all the areas, 15 resources-wise, cost-wise, the potential area that 16 would be the most costly is on NRC computer code 17 development within Strategy 2, if you were to look at 18 it from a budget perspective.
19 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I sense that's the 20 reason we got asked the question in front of the 21 Commission.
22 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
23 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Because I do think, as 24 you're saying, you want to think about this from a 25 planning standpoint, in a way that is efficient and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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37 1 effective, not just --
2 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, that's all.
4 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. And when we developed 5 the budget estimates for the various years, the number 6 is relatively consistent over a five-year timeframe, 7 and includes the work for the codes and the funding 8 that has been provided by Congress covers that also.
9 So, this is just a summary of the ACRS 10 letter. I assume you probably don't have any 11 questions on your own letter.
12 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I love that slide.
13 MR. MONNINGER: You love that slide?
14 (Laughter.)
15 MR. MONNINGER: So, also, this year, in the 16 Congressional, in the approval of the NRC's budget, 17 was direction to the NRC. And the direction to the 18 NRC was to prepare a report on CASL.
19 NRC's report discusses both CASL and NEAMS 20 and came out of the 2018 Consolidated Appropriations 21 Act and it asked the NRC to discuss the potential uses 22 of CASL tools in our licensing and safety reviews.
23 MEMBER REMPE: John, actually, I guess I 24 wanted to interrupt you on both of these two first 25 bullets. I don't -- I actually tried last night to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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38 1 look up that act and could not find the specific text.
2 And then, I don't know if -- we weren't 3 given, as part of our materials to read, the response 4 back. And I'd be interested if you could provide that 5 to Weidong, so we could see your response back?
6 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. So, I'll give a copy 7 to Weidong. And then, I won't try to do the citation 8 for the appropriate appropriations language, because 9 I'll --
10 MEMBER REMPE: But you're -- this is --
11 MR. MONNINGER: -- I'll cite it --
12 MEMBER REMPE: -- pretty much a pretty good 13 summary --
14 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
15 MEMBER REMPE: -- of what they told you to 16 do?
17 MR. MONNINGER: So, it's on Page 55, and 18 this is within the NRC's budget authorization 19 language. Modeling and simulation tools.
20 The Commission is directed to report to 21 the Committees on Appropriations of both Houses of 22 Congress, not later than 180 days after the enactment 23 of this Act, the Commission's potential uses of the 24 Consortium for Advanced Simulation of Light Water 25 Reactors in licensing processes and safety reviews.
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39 1 So, that's the first bullet. And I'll 2 give a copy to Weidong.
3 And then, the NRC responded in a letter 4 from the Chairman to the oversight committees in a 5 letter dated September 27, 2018.
6 MEMBER REMPE: Okay.
7 MR. MONNINGER: And our response, even 8 though the language asks us to address just CASL, we 9 have been working very closely with DOE over the years 10 also on NEAMS, and believed it was important to also 11 discuss NEAMS and consideration for advanced reactors.
12 We highlighted in there our ongoing 13 efforts to work with DOE and to leverage the programs 14 and the supporting modeling and simulation codes to 15 the best extent possible. We indicated that, where 16 appropriate, we would use our codes and, where 17 appropriate, we would use the DOE-sponsored codes.
18 In the end, we basically said, if we can 19 meet NRC's mission and provide the functionality, we 20 will look at, what is the most cost-effective means to 21 do so?
22 So, then, some thoughts on codes for 23 advanced reactors. I mentioned the regulatory 24 infrastructure, funding provided by Congress.
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40 1 it's very important to us to be prepared to conduct 2 the timely and effective licensing reviews.
3 We also believe that, given the special 4 funding provided by Congress, it is important for us 5 to provide focused oversight of that funding. We are 6 asked to report -- so, this is internal within our 7 division, it's nothing special coming from the 8 Commission or Office Directors, et cetera.
9 But in terms of budget preparations, et 10 cetera, over the past couple years, we get quite a few 11 questions from Congress, where have you spent your 12 funding, how prepared are you, et cetera.
13 So, we are placing additional emphasis on 14 ensuring that we are effectively managing those funds 15 and we can respond back to whoever may ask that 16 question.
17 And we also want to be transparent on our 18 rationale, recommendations, and decisions. And that 19 extends to the codes and that extends to the proposed 20 future engagement with the ACRS and future engagement 21 with the industry.
22 We want the industry to be knowledgeable 23 as to why we decided to go down X path. They don't 24 have to agree with it. We'll of course listen to 25 their comments and, as appropriate, consider changing NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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41 1 our direction. But we want it to be well documented 2 and provided out there.
3 So, with that, there's a very, very broad 4 range of reactor designs out there. The three 5 technology working groups and whether 20 different 6 designs are under consideration, 40 different designs, 7 50 different designs. It's a very large landscape out 8 there.
9 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: What is the 10 interaction between the staff, the NRC staff, and 11 these technology working groups? Are -- is it 12 observation or are staff engaged with these working 13 groups to have a conversation?
14 MR. MONNINGER: So, we are not members of 15 the technology working groups. The technology working 16 groups are, Everett could correct me, but sponsored, 17 chartered, funded, organized, under NEI, the three 18 different technology working groups, and they have a 19 lead and members.
20 With that said, we have our periodic 21 stakeholder meetings and representatives from the TWGs 22 are there.
23 They will have meetings and they will 24 invite the staff to come and provide an update on X 25 regulatory initiative. However, we don't sit in on NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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42 1 their working level meetings. But there is very good 2 communications with them and --
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, it's a periodic --
4 does Everett want to say anything at this point?
5 You're kind of acknowledging him, so I'm curious if 6 you want help.
7 MR. MONNINGER: Yes, is that fair, Everett?
8 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: You've got to come to 9 the mic, Everett. Identify yourself with sufficient 10 clarity and volume. There's a switch at the bottom of 11 that mic, I think.
12 MR. REDMOND: Everett Redmond with NEI.
13 That's accurate, John, description. We help support 14 the technology-specific working groups. NRC engages 15 with them at regular intervals.
16 They also engage with the Advanced Reactor 17 Working Group, which NEI hosts. And then, as John, I 18 think, mentioned, numerous public engagements 19 throughout the year.
20 So, yes, NRC engages with the technology 21 working groups, as well as the specific vendors on 22 their specific activities.
23 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Thank you. You have 24 to turn it off too, I'm sorry. We don't have the best 25 A/V in here.
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43 1 MR. MONNINGER: So, again, the effective 2 and efficient licensing review. And in deciding the 3 path forward on these, we really need to consider the 4 life cycle costs of those.
5 So, it's not just a notion of NRC has a 6 code on our computers, on our shelves, et cetera, but 7 there's ongoing maintenance. There's the potential to 8 transition the staff.
9 Say, for example, hypothetically, NRC 10 sponsors 20 codes. Maybe it's those codes on Slide 2 11 or 3, or it could be more or less. Are we then going 12 to potentially adopt five or ten more? And then, what 13 does that do to our infrastructure, what does that do 14 to our training, et cetera.
15 Or if we decide to adopt five or ten new 16 codes, will we then decide to de-fund or to put on the 17 shelf some of the existing codes? So, there's costs 18 in terms of what we decide to do.
19 There would be -- say, for example, one of 20 the -- and it probably isn't 20 on the previous 21 slides, but we decide to use one of the codes on Slide 22 2. There would be -- on one of the previous slides.
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44 1 if we decide to adopt and use a DOE-sponsored code.
2 So, you just have to --
3 MR. SCHULTZ: So, John, your second bullet 4 means, you're talking about, if NRC decides to develop 5 codes themselves, then there are other costs that need 6 to be considered in the life cycle, including 7 development, verification, validation, maintenance, 8 and training?
9 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
10 MR. SCHULTZ: And then, the third bullet is 11 a separate option or perhaps an option that could be 12 used in addition, for certain --
13 MR. MONNINGER: So, I think the second one 14 is -- whatever we decide to do, say, for example, we 15 decide to use MELCOR going forward.
16 There's some incremental cost in modifying 17 MELCOR to support the needs of non-light water 18 reactors and training for staff and maybe some 19 incremental yearly funded needed to support MELCOR for 20 a broader range of applications. So, maybe that 21 funding picture is this.
22 Maybe the NRC decides, well, no, we want 23 a different severe accident integrated code. That 24 cost would be significantly different than some type 25 of delta off of MELCOR.
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45 1 The third option would be, maybe there's 2 another DOE-sponsored code out there. If that was the 3 case, if we adopted that, we would most likely not 4 have the cost associated with modification of the 5 NRC's existing codes. However, there would be 6 continuing base-level cost of having that within our 7 infrastructure.
8 MR. SCHULTZ: That's right.
9 MR. MONNINGER: Okay.
10 MR. SCHULTZ: And, there, you would be 11 talking about the training and some element of 12 maintenance, but you would be depending upon whatever 13 outside agency that would be to do the development, 14 the validation, the verification, and so forth.
15 MR. MONNINGER: We would hope to. We would 16 hope to. So, if we were to go -- and DOE has been 17 very receptive, in terms of our interest. But in the 18 end, DOE, they would control what does occur. To a 19 certain extent, NRC has -- NRC has much more control 20 over NRC-sponsored codes.
21 MR. SCHULTZ: Of course.
22 MR. MONNINGER: We can request Sandia to do 23 something on a certain timeframe.
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46 1 eventually I'm going to ask about, but maybe later.
2 I think where Steve is going is kind of 3 where we're both worried, which is, if you choose X 4 instead of Y, who's responsible for X, who has the 5 validation portfolio for X, and if it's found wanting 6 --
7 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
8 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- who pays to 9 properly upgrade it?
10 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
12 MR. MONNINGER: And those are some of the 13 ongoing thoughts and discussions, in coming up with 14 our recommendation.
15 MEMBER REMPE: And as you think about that, 16 there's other models. From my understanding, the 17 SCALE is an example of a code that is jointly managed, 18 is that a way of saying it?, by DOE and NRC, that you 19 figure out what activities need to be done to keep it 20 up to snuff and jointly decide who pays for those 21 activities?
22 MR. MONNINGER: So, I can't go -- I'm not 23 versed in the specifics of SCALE, but the answer would 24 be, yes. We would have to work through all those 25 details if the decision is to proceed with SCALE.
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47 1 So, a lot of the same considerations 2 previously and why we would do a confirmatory 3 analysis. But then, I think, we do believe that there 4 are other considerations out there.
5 The Commission has the policy statement 6 for advanced reactors and has established certain 7 expectations out there in terms of designs that are 8 more robust, designs that are more forgiving, designs 9 that aren't relying upon as much active systems, 10 enhanced margins of safety, et cetera.
11 So, when the staff is proceeding with a 12 proposed rulemaking, for example, for EP, for SMRs and 13 other nuclear technology, or the staff is going in 14 front of the Commission requesting permission to 15 consider doing a proposed rulemaking on consequence-16 based security, behind a lot of these efforts is --
17 there is an underpinning of non-light water reactors, 18 advanced reactors meeting these expectations.
19 And then, if you hear -- in our 20 interactions with applicants and developers, there's 21 a commitment to this. So, then, if that is then 22 achieved, we do believe there should be consideration 23 of that given to the extent of confirmatory analysis 24 done.
25 It would need to be demonstrated by the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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48 1 applicants that those margins are there, and in 2 unique, novel areas, we may still proceed with doing 3 confirmatory analysis.
4 But in a perfect world, if the baseline 5 level of safety for the non-light water reactors is an 6 order of magnitude or more lower, there should be less 7 of a real need for NRC to do confirmatory analysis.
8 How we factor this in, we haven't --
9 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I agree with you. I 10 think that -- but I -- so, just to pick on where I 11 think Jose was going, there's two ways to do it, now 12 that I've been properly educated with the LMP.
13 One is that I have highly reliable or 14 minimally needed safety systems that reduce the 15 frequency of the event, or there's something unique 16 about the design that reduces the potential dose --
17 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- or the, we'll call 19 it the boundary dose. But you are going to need some 20 sort of tool that can clearly identify what the source 21 term is and how it leads from the tool through the, 22 I'll call it the reactor system --
23 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
24 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- to the larger 25 system that can -- the building outside, that I won't NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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49 1 use the C-word --
2 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- all right?
4 MR. MONNINGER: Or the FC, functional 5 containment.
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Thank you. Or the FC-7 word. Well, that hasn't --
8 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
9 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- I don't think the 10 Commission's gone there yet, so I'm not going to --
11 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
12 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- but the outside 13 building. So, there's -- that part of that has got to 14 be known well enough or with high enough margin, so 15 that one can say, essentially, come to the conclusion 16 you've come to.
17 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
19 MR. MONNINGER: And an applicant, in doing 20 so, they could do that a couple different ways. One 21 is, they could do it -- have some -- one is, they 22 could propose a very conservative analysis, such that 23 -- or they could try to be much more sharper, much 24 more best estimate, which would then raise higher the 25 level or higher the potential for NRC to do NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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50 1 confirmatory analysis.
2 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: So, let me use the 3 techniques of marketing, TV ads. Let's repeat, the 4 purpose of the confirmatory calculations are training 5 of the staff, the determination of uncertainty, and 6 there's a third one, which is very important, 7 especially for first-of-a-kind calculations, which is, 8 what does the applicant mean? Is there an event that 9 they didn't consider?
10 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
11 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Is an event that 12 progresses differently with different assumptions?
13 That's where the staff should concentrate most on --
14 I mean, we don't want to reproduce the calculation and 15 say, instead of ten to the minus seven, is 1.2 ten to 16 the minus seven. That has no value.
17 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
18 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: We have to see if they 19 miss something that was ten to the minus three.
20 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
21 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: And that's where the 22 confirmatory and the becoming familiar with the 23 process, which we are not. And I know nothing about 24 molten salt, for example.
25 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
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51 1 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: You have to become 2 familiar to know what they missed.
3 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
4 MR. SCHULTZ: John, I took it that your 5 statement, quick and simple to explore -- that the 6 explore sensitivities was where you were trying to 7 capture that.
8 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
9 MR. SCHULTZ: I would question, in any 10 case, quick and simple. But to explore sensitivities 11 would be the objective that would satisfy that need.
12 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. So, I would -- maybe 13 we could delete, and simple. But I think, in terms of 14 licensing, we want -- if we do the confirmatory 15 analysis, we do want something that can be done in a 16 timeframe to support the front end of the licensing 17 review.
18 In reality, the staff front-end loads our 19 review and Phase 1 is issuance of the RAIs. That is 20 the time, prior to Phase 1 being complete, you want 21 all your confirmatory calculations done, where we 22 identify potential areas that we have questions on.
23 We want to raise those in the RAIs. We 24 want to be conducting the audits based upon insights 25 from the confirmatory analysis, within Phase 1.
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52 1 So, to the extent that the calculations 2 need to be fully representative of the design, versus 3 -- yes. So, there is a need for quickness or 4 timeliness in any calculations --
5 MR. SCHULTZ: Sure.
6 MR. MONNINGER: -- we do. And ideally, 7 they'd be exercised by the Licensing Office.
8 Currently, I would say, more than 50 percent, and it's 9 not the right number, but the vast majority of the 10 confirmatory analyses are currently done for our 11 office by the Office of Research.
12 But I think in a best case world, you 13 would want your licensing reviewer, your reactor 14 systems engineer, to have that code for the training 15 purposes, for the insights purposes --
16 MR. SCHULTZ: Yes, I was going to --
17 MR. MONNINGER: -- with the licensing side.
18 MR. SCHULTZ: -- re-emphasize the training 19 of the staff, so that they would be prepared to do 20 what you're describing.
21 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
22 MR. SCHULTZ: Thank you.
23 MR. MONNINGER: So, and then, typical Phase 24 1 reviews, RAIs, and this will get into the issue of 25 schedules, so 42 months, the APR1400, and schedule NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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53 1 isn't scaled by power or source term, but if you were 2 to do that, 1400 megawatt, APR1400 versus a micro-3 reactor, two megawatts, you would complete the review 4 in 1.8 days.
5 So, there isn't a direct scaling between 6 that. And there's not also a direct scaling between 7 level of NRC resources to do it.
8 However, with that said, the NRC does need 9 to be effective and efficient, making timely 10 decisions, and we -- the level of resources need to be 11 commiserate with the risk posed by the reactor 12 designs.
13 So, you can't scale it directly to power, 14 but both the schedule and resources need to be 15 commiserate.
16 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Yes, I agree that you 17 cannot scale it by -- you have to scale it to risk --
18 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
19 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: -- as you were saying.
20 And unfortunately, to know what the risk is, you have 21 to have a good PRA to start with.
22 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
23 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: And so, you need to 24 understand what can go wrong --
25 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
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54 1 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: -- and that's where 2 you need your knowledge and your calculations.
3 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
4 MEMBER BALLINGER: I'd be a little careful 5 using the APR1400 as an example, since that was a 6 System 80+ design and still took 42 months.
7 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
8 MEMBER BALLINGER: As opposed to, we 9 reduced it to 42 months.
10 MR. MONNINGER: Right. And then, for the 11 NuScale application, we established timelines that 12 were even shorter than that, but I think, when you 13 look at some of the micro-reactors, non-light water 14 reactors, there's interest in even a much 15 significantly shorter schedule out there. And --
16 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: We're going to try to 17 be quiet so you can get through your last set of 18 slides.
19 MR. MONNINGER: Okay. So, the confirmatory 20 -- in terms of cost and effort, if we do confirmatory 21 analysis, it's got to be in line with the overall NRC 22 review costs.
23 And the last one is, say, for example, our 24 tools did not have the level of robustness in an area 25 or we didn't have a model to explore a certain thing, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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55 1 and we still had a desire to do confirmatory analysis, 2 but we didn't have a tool, the burden then to address 3 that would be placed upon the applicants.
4 We would issue RAIs, we would do audits, 5 we would discuss their testing, or in the end, we 6 could put limitations on operations to address that 7 area.
8 So, we mentioned Research leading the 9 effort, with our staff in NRO. They're looking at it 10 for a range of applications.
11 Here's some of the factors that are being 12 considered. I believe Steve might have potentially, 13 Dr. Steve Bajorek had potentially been to the ACRS in 14 the past, discussing the CRAB suite. So, a lot of 15 this is from the approach that they have discussed in 16 the past.
17 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: What -- can you repeat 18 that? I don't think I understand.
19 MR. MONNINGER: So --
20 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Because I don't think 21 Steve has said anything to us, at least in a formal 22 meeting structure, that I'm aware of. Did he?
23 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
24 MEMBER REMPE: He answered questions about, 25 when we had -- there were two documents on that Vision NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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56 1 and Strategy --
2 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
3 MEMBER REMPE: -- and Steve was involved 4 heavily, I think, in the second one.
5 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Oh, for Strategy --
6 MEMBER REMPE: And he answered some 7 questions, yes.
8 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, fine. Excuse 9 me, I'm sorry.
10 MR. MONNINGER: Okay.
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Yes, Joy's right.
12 Sorry.
13 MR. MONNINGER: So, I think a lot of the 14 points here, I've addressed or you've asked question 15 on, the verification validation. In terms of running 16 the code, it would be much more beneficial to use if 17 we could perform it in-house or have facilities 18 available to run those.
19 Proceeding forward, in terms of doing an 20 assessment of the codes and where the codes 21 potentially have gaps or need to be further enhanced, 22 the Office of Research is looking at the Predictive 23 Capability Maturity Model, I guess was developed by 24 Sandia.
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57 1 six different areas. And it then asks you to assess 2 where you are, in terms of these various areas. And 3 this is currently being done by the Office of Research 4 for us, and these are some of the areas we would 5 engage with the ACRS in future meetings.
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Can I take you back?
7 I told you we would be quiet, but then -- if you go 8 back to Slide 19? Yes.
9 So, I work the problem backwards in my 10 mind, maybe it's because I'm just a -- I was going to 11 use the word lazy engineer, but as an engineer, you 12 work the problem backwards.
13 You start with the big system and you work 14 backwards. And so, the big system tells me, the thing 15 that worries me is source term transport. And I was 16 looking for that word somewhere in that slide and it 17 isn't there. So, that's what leads me to your backup 18 slide, which you used source term.
19 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
20 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, when the time is 21 right, I want to get to the backup slides, because the 22 concern I've got is, we, even as a Committee, have 23 lost one of our experts and need that --
24 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
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58 1 a timely review of what you present us, when it 2 arrives.
3 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, source term, to me 5 is the thing that drives a lot of this from a safety 6 analysis standpoint.
7 MEMBER KIRCHNER: Mike, may I chime in at 8 this --
9 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Sure.
10 MEMBER KIRCHNER: -- point.
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Go ahead, Walt.
12 MEMBER KIRCHNER: Yes. I have the same 13 concern. I haven't heard about prioritization of your 14 investments and efforts.
15 The first thing you're going to have to 16 deal with, in my opinion, is the source term issue, 17 because any of the applicants is going to want to 18 address emergency planning.
19 So, you do have a draft Reg Guide that's 20 part of rulemaking, but it's essentially silent on how 21 to develop the source term.
22 So, there's both the procedural aspect of 23 developing the source term, that would be adequate to 24 convince you that PRA, classes of accidents, then 25 subsequent failure or disruption of some kind, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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59 1 transport through multiple barriers, then dose 2 consequence in the environment.
3 So, it would seem to me, that would come 4 to the fore. I'm less concerned about physics, about 5 reactor physics that is. Those codes are pretty 6 mature. Cross-sections, that's pretty mature.
7 Thermal-hydraulics is very well developed.
8 So, it seems to me, looking at your 9 earlier chart, if you say to first order on Chart 10 Number 8 that any of the new concepts are also going 11 to have to demonstrate capability in all those areas 12 that are on that diagram, I immediately go right to 13 the source term, as an issue that will stymie a timely 14 review, if the capability isn't there, the 15 methodology, and the data, experimental data, to back 16 it up, and the codes that are validated to make that 17 case.
18 Otherwise, I think the applicants will 19 have to fall back on some scaling, based on 0396, 20 because this is a very difficult -- I mean, there's 21 been a huge investment by both you, the DOE, the 22 industry in getting to where we are.
23 And it seems to me that somehow, when you 24 overlay the map of all the concepts that are out 25 there, that you might have to review, you've got a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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60 1 very full plate.
2 And it seems to me, you've got to start 3 thinking about prioritizing where you invest and where 4 you perhaps rely on someone else. Maybe that's coming 5 up in another slide.
6 But I see this source term, mechanistic 7 source term, it's a term of art that's thrown out very 8 lightly, but it's an extraordinarily difficult thing 9 to do and back up with real data.
10 And that, again, since it will impact 11 early on things like emergency planning, which will 12 impact decisions about whether to go forward with the 13 actual concept, I see some need to prioritize.
14 The other, since I've interrupted you, it 15 seems to me the other thing that you need to consider 16 as you look at the concepts and say, in each of these 17 different concepts, where are the cliff effects?
18 Where can things go -- it's a variant on what Jose was 19 pointing out, the unknowns. Where can things go wrong 20 with a major change in results?
21 And they're there for several of these 22 concepts. And it's a different phenomena than what 23 you would see in an LWR.
24 So that, to me, also would provide a means 25 to start thinking through, well, we've got this large NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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61 1 waterfront to cover, our resources are limited, where 2 are we going to put our investments going forward?
3 Thank you, Mike.
4 MR. MONNINGER: So, fully agree with you.
5 And I think in our subsequent meetings, we'll cover 6 source term, we'll cover beyond-design-basis 7 accidents, et cetera. And we'll also cover the work 8 that we want to prioritize.
9 MEMBER REMPE: Actually, would you put up 10 Slide 23, that's your backup slide, since Mike 11 mentioned it, which is hard to see with the lighting 12 in here. No, this was the one I wanted.
13 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
14 MEMBER REMPE: Okay. So, the fact that you 15 have MELCOR on there with a dashed line means that, 16 when you're looking under -- it says Comprehensive 17 Reactor Analysis Bundle Under Evaluation, that means 18 none of the DOE codes have been developed for 19 evaluating source term. Is that what we should all 20 conclude here?
21 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. So, it was 22 deliberately put in backup slides, for one. So, the 23 Office of Research is working through a set of 24 potential recommendations for design-basis accidents, 25 and on the next slide, for other areas, including NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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62 1 severe accidents.
2 It's still under consideration. They're 3 developing the report. We've iterated somewhat with 4 them on the report and recommendations, but we haven't 5 made any real decisions on going forward.
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: This is what you were 7 hinting at earlier?
8 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. So, this is what will 9 come in the future meetings, to discuss with you. But 10 we have to make sure we have something to share with 11 you, we want to share our report and recommendations 12 with you.
13 MEMBER REMPE: Yes, it's just kind of 14 interesting with all the attention being placed on 15 what DOE has done.
16 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
17 MEMBER REMPE: This meeting, that you're 18 basically relying on what you have, I'm wondering, 19 it's going to be curious to see what the different 20 applicants are going to use. I mean, some of them may 21 come in with the NRC --
22 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
23 MEMBER REMPE: -- tool for the source term.
24 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: That's a good lead-in 25 for your takeaways.
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63 1 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. So, then, the 2 takeaways. We will be back and we're looking forward 3 to it.
4 (Laughter.)
5 MR. MONNINGER: It'll actually -- so, my 6 presentation's actually easy, because I'm at the 7 40,000-foot level. So, the staff staff will be back 8 at the next meeting.
9 So, we're assessing our needs, 10 recommendations. It's really important to us to get 11 the ACRS's feedback. We have really taken to heart 12 the need to be ready.
13 And we want the best insights from 14 Research, we want the best insights from our staff, we 15 want the best insights from the ACRS, and we want the 16 best insights from DOE, and we want industry to know 17 where we're going and why.
18 And we will ask, eventually, for a letter 19 on that.
20 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: That actually -- to 21 me, that's important. Because I want to make sure 22 when we feedback, we feedback to the appropriate place 23 with staff. So, I appreciate it.
24 Questions by the Committee for John before 25 we switch to the next speaker? Okay. I think Andrew NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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64 1 is next, is that -- do I have that correct? And you 2 have a helper? Okay.
3 Okay. We have a big audience that's 4 anxiously trying to get a copy of your slides. Why 5 don't you go ahead, Andrew?
6 MR. PROFFITT: Okay, thank you. Good 7 morning. I'm Andrew Proffitt, I'm the Project Manager 8 for Accident-Tolerant Fuel in NRR. Thanks for having 9 us here to talk about our plans for confirmatory 10 analysis for ATF designs.
11 I don't think I could have asked for a 12 better lead-in from John and some of the comments so 13 far from the Committee. I think we're well aligned.
14 So, next slide, please.
15 Outline of a few things I'll talk about.
16 I'll just briefly touch on our approach to 17 confirmatory analysis, I think John did a pretty good 18 job of covering all that. We're completely aligned 19 with his presentation, I just wanted to include it 20 here for completeness for the slide deck.
21 Go through our confirmatory analysis 22 strategy for ATF and what we plan to employ for 23 confirmatory analysis.
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65 1 their advanced modeling and simulation tools, as it 2 applies to ATF. Next slide.
3 So, just very quickly, our approach to 4 confirmatory analysis is generally informed by the 5 phenomena important to safety.
6 And we are undergoing, as part of the ATF 7 project plan, which we just finalized in September, we 8 outline a strategy for conducting phenomena 9 identification and ranking table exercises.
10 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: If I might just 11 interject, just for the Committee's sake, we did get 12 a copy of that. That was part of what's on the G 13 Drive for the Committee to look at.
14 MR. PROFFITT: Okay.
15 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Sorry.
16 MR. PROFFITT: Great. So, our evaluation 17 can range from a number of things. It can include 18 just a review of the information provided by the 19 applicant or licensee, where the reviewer draws on 20 previous knowledge and accumulated expertise to reach 21 a safety determination.
22 We can employ confirmatory calculations, 23 which could range from things like John mentioned, 24 quick and simple, back of the envelope type things, to 25 more complex, even coupled code systems to model NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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66 1 significant portions of a reactor system.
2 And even it could, in some rare cases, 3 maybe just pursue independent confirmatory testing in 4 support of reaching a safety finding.
5 So, in general, for ATF, the staff expect 6 that our approach for most designs will likely follow 7 the middle bullet there, we'll use independent 8 confirmatory calculations to assist us in reaching our 9 safety finding in an efficient and effective manner.
10 And this goes to a lot of things that have 11 been mentioned this morning, with ATF in some cases 12 being first-of-a-kind, to understand sensitivities, to 13 have the reviewers full understand the phenomena that 14 are important. So, quite a few things, and I think a 15 lot of that's been mentioned this morning. Next 16 slide.
17 So, our strategy for ATF in seeking to 18 support a most efficient and effective review, we 19 considered several avenues.
20 We've considered enhancing NRC's existing 21 NRC codes to model ATF concepts. We've also looked 22 outside the NRC, at DOE, vendor, and commercial codes.
23 And we've used other codes besides NRC 24 staff-sponsored codes in the past in certain areas, so 25 there's been instances where we've run vendor codes in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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67 1 support of our safety analysis, there's been uses 2 where we've used commercial codes in support of our 3 safety analysis. And this also includes the DOE's 4 advanced modeling and simulation capabilities.
5 Key factors for determining which approach 6 would be appropriate for ATF would be the staff's 7 experience and knowledge using the tool, along with 8 any associated learning curve that would be required 9 for the staff to become proficient with modeling in 10 the code, and also, a full understanding of the 11 assumptions and limitations of the tool. Yes?
12 MEMBER REMPE: Okay. So, I was very 13 interested in the document and I looked through your 14 slides. And so, a lot of my questions today are 15 coming up spontaneously on different slides, because 16 I don't know where else to put them --
17 MR. PROFFITT: Okay.
18 MEMBER REMPE: -- because there's a lot 19 more content in that document.
20 MR. PROFFITT: Yes, absolutely.
21 MEMBER REMPE: For example, right now, in 22 your document, you explicitly say, hey, in the near-23 term, we've been told the vendors are going to use 24 their existing tools, because -- and you've made the 25 conclusion, we're going to be also using our existing NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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68 1 tools.
2 And I mean, last meeting, Shane Johnson 3 said, well, he thinks it's because it's cheaper for 4 them to continue on with their existing tools. And I 5 figure you're doing it for the same reason.
6 MR. PROFFITT: Yes.
7 MEMBER REMPE: In light of that, are you in 8 the driver's seat for working with the vendors on what 9 data they need to modify their existing tools, so that 10 they will be appropriately validated for this 11 application?
12 And then, also, so you can use your tools 13 to apply them for that application? Because it seems 14 like there's some good cost savings to be done at this 15 time.
16 The other thing is that I didn't see 17 anywhere in your slides today that discusses the 18 application that the vendor has in mind.
19 And my understanding from most recent 20 discussions I've heard, is that the vendors have 21 realized that the ATF will cost more. So, in order to 22 deploy it, they have to have a good economic case.
23 And in your document, you identified some 24 tasks that involved using the SPAR model to try and --
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69 1 that economic benefit.
2 And it looks like you've been thinking 3 along about, well, what are we going to have to be 4 evaluating by having those tasks with the SPAR models?
5 And so, when I was looking at that, I was 6 also thinking about, this would be great for a 7 collaborative effort. The LWRS program has recently 8 spent a lot of effort to focus on the economics of 9 light water reactors.
10 And have you been discussing with the 11 Department of Energy how this might be -- I mean, 12 you've got the tools with the SPAR models.
13 I'm not sure, I think there's something in 14 the risk MC stuff that might be usable, but it seems 15 like to me that this would be a good collaborative 16 DOE/NRC effort. Has that hit your radar yet?
17 MR. PROFFITT: Okay. Well, I'll try to 18 start with, I guess, the first question on the data.
19 So, we do have -- we've added an addenda to our 20 Memorandum of Understanding with the Department of 21 Energy, such that we can help with data sharing.
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70 1 gathering and we want to facilitate obtaining that 2 data before licensing submittal, so that we can 3 incorporate it into our codes.
4 I know in one example, for FeCrAl, we've 5 been using DOE handbooks that have been published out 6 of Oak Ridge to incorporate properties already into 7 our FAST codes.
8 And the project plan, I think, 9 acknowledges that fact, that the need for real-time 10 data is very important to be able to ensure that our 11 codes are developed in a timely manner.
12 MEMBER REMPE: So, are there some examples 13 where you've identified some data that perhaps some of 14 the vendors have forgotten about and that they are 15 being receptive to your input and saying, yes, you're 16 right and we'll make sure we get that data too? I 17 mean, how is this interaction working?
18 MR. PROFFITT: So, I think we're a little 19 bit early in that process. We have initiated for the 20 coated cladding concept of ATF a PIRT exercise.
21 And so, certainly, we all have some ideas 22 in our minds of what things may need to be addressed, 23 but we definitely want to let that take its course.
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71 1 timeframe. And then, an expert elicitation process to 2 go through and have outside experts take a look at 3 that preliminary report and provide us feedback.
4 And so, following the PIRT, I think we'll 5 have a much better idea and a much more robust 6 document, to be able to go down those avenues with the 7 vendors. But we're certainly starting those 8 conversations now, but I think we'll be in a better 9 place once we complete that.
10 MEMBER REMPE: Okay.
11 MR. PROFFITT: And then, to the second, 12 looking into the application that the vendors have in 13 mind, we're certainly having those discussions.
14 One of the things, EPRI is working on a 15 document called ATF 2.0, that we're expecting early 16 next year. And that's looking at potential cost 17 recovery, margin recovery efforts that they may be 18 undertaking. So, they've done round one to that 19 study, they didn't make it publicly available yet.
20 But we're certainly staying engaged and 21 we're anxiously awaiting that, because we do want to 22 be prepared for where -- the first step is, obviously, 23 batch licensing under the current regulatory regime, 24 essentially.
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72 1 vendors, that's the effort they want to go through, 2 because they don't think they'll be able to take 3 advantage of all the benefits of the ATF until they 4 get a full core in anyway, so that will take a couple 5 reloads.
6 So, our understanding of the process 7 they're looking to follow is, get it in under the 8 current paradigm and then, come later, a couple years 9 later, and look to capitalize on some of those 10 benefits, potentially.
11 MEMBER REMPE: In your task description, 12 you actually specify, we need to do pilots. And I 13 think that's a good point, because I don't think you 14 can do a generic, oh, this is going to be more 15 economical, I think it's going to be very plant 16 specific.
17 And again, I think, if you can work with 18 some other industry organizations or DOE to try and 19 find that -- develop those insights and, if it's 20 possible, I think that would be important to help 21 facilitate this process.
22 MR. PROFFITT: Yes, absolutely. And I've 23 got some of our risk folks here, I don't know if they 24 wanted to speak more to the LWRS program or -- I'm not 25 too familiar with our interaction there. Okay, I see, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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73 1 okay. We'll save that for later.
2 MEMBER REMPE: Thank you.
3 MR. PROFFITT: Thank you.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Don, did you want to 5 add something?
6 MR. HELTON: I can, unless you want to move 7 on.
8 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Go ahead.
9 MR. HELTON: Okay. Don Helton, Office of 10 Nuclear Reactor Regulation. I just want to point out, 11 the Agency has been engaged with the Risk-Informed 12 Safety Margins Characterization Pathway of Light Water 13 Reactor Sustainability, so we are familiar with the 14 risk tools that they're developing under that.
15 The pilots that were mentioned under the 16 ATF plan are part of making sure that our PRA modeling 17 is ready for the oversight function it needs to fill 18 once these accident-tolerant fuels are actually in 19 operation, to make sure we're modeling the as-operated 20 as-built plant.
21 But to -- and I don't know if that's a 22 sign from above --
23 (Laughter.)
24 MR. HELTON: It was well coordinated there 25 with the lights going out.
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74 1 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: You can take that as 2 a sign.
3 (Laughter.)
4 MR. HELTON: As my wife would tell you, I'm 5 not good with picking up on subtleties. The only 6 other point I would make is that, to Dr. March-Leuba's 7 earlier point, we're aware of the fact that, as we 8 proceed towards licensing, there are going to be 9 questions about what the changes in risk are and how 10 that should influence our prioritization of 11 activities. And so, that is the other benefit of the 12 pilots that you mentioned.
13 MR. PROFFITT: Okay.
14 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Feel free to move on.
15 MR. PROFFITT: All right, next slide. So, 16 we've decided that, for near-term concepts, that the 17 best approach will be to modify our existing codes, 18 which will hopefully require minor modification.
19 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, clarification, 20 near-term means coated claddings and doped fuel?
21 MR. PROFFITT: And --
22 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: What is --
23 MR. PROFFITT: -- FeCrAl, I would say, is 24 on the edge of that. So, that's sort of one that 25 we're considering. But, yes.
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75 1 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, it's a boundary?
2 MR. PROFFITT: It's more in a gray area, I 3 guess, but yes, coated claddings and doped fuel.
4 So, those areas include fuel performance, 5 thermal-hydraulics, neutronics, and severe accident 6 source term progression.
7 So, the decision was based on several 8 factors, with the highlights being, our codes are very 9 tailored to evaluate the regulatory requirements, 10 meaning they're more focused to the objective than 11 tools seeking to model the entire system in greater 12 fidelity.
13 The staff in the Licensing Offices and in 14 the Office of Research are very familiar and 15 comfortable using our existing suite of codes. There 16 will be a very shallow learning codes to enable 17 modeling of ATF and we believe we'll have high 18 confidence in those results.
19 For the near-term ATF concepts, as I 20 mentioned, it should be very minor modifications 21 required and in some cases, we've already begun 22 implementation of those modifications.
23 And then, the last bullet, there's no 24 codes that are currently validated for AFT. So, all 25 options would require the staff -- and for the staff NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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76 1 to rely on an outside entity on this aggressive 2 timeline would also involve some risk in that 3 decision. So, that went into our thought process.
4 And also, in this consideration was the 5 understanding that any development would need to 6 precede licensing activity, so timeliness is very 7 important to us in this. Next slide.
8 This is from the ATF project plan. It 9 gives a graphical view of the process for updating 10 these codes. And as I mentioned before, the PIRT 11 exercise is our first step in this process. And as 12 I mentioned, it's currently underway for coated 13 claddings.
14 This will ensure that all new phenomena 15 important to safety are identified and considered in 16 the planning phases. The results will be used to 17 inform the code development efforts.
18 The next step would be scoping studies, 19 which have already been performed with the current 20 knowledge base, but will be augmented following the 21 completion of the PIRT.
22 Then, where necessary, the code 23 architecture modifications will be made. For example, 24 to move Zirc UO2 hardwired properties in the codes, or 25 assumptions, and things similar to that, that have NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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77 1 been based on the use of the current fuel technology 2 for the past several decades, essentially.
3 Material properties will be added and new 4 models will be developed where necessary. And this 5 also -- these arrows back and forth indicate the 6 interaction between the testing data, as it comes in, 7 and the model development and how that moves forward.
8 And so, that's obviously very important 9 and that's highlighted in the project plan, that near-10 term data acquisition will be very important in 11 ensuring our readiness.
12 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Do you consider the 13 chemistry of these fuels in corrosion, iron transport, 14 things like that, on your validations? Or would that 15 be 100 percent experimental?
16 MR. PROFFITT: So, I think at this time, it 17 will probably be experimental, it will probably be 18 empirical in nature. But I don't know if Ian is with 19 us this morning, our fuel performance, to maybe give 20 any other --
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Everybody else is 22 here, so --
23 (Laughter.)
24 MR. PROFFITT: Yes, that's right.
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78 1 we've lost our chemist in the membership.
2 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: It goes beyond -- I 3 think Jose's point is well taken, it goes beyond just 4 source term, it goes beyond to chemistry effects 5 relative to normal operation, as well as under 6 accident situation. Oh, there he is.
7 MR. PORTER: Okay.
8 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: You've got to turn a 9 switch.
10 MR. PORTER: All right. Ian Porter, Office 11 of Research. So, largely, we're going to be empirical 12 at this point in time.
13 And most of the chemistry effects, we 14 actually do not directly model a lot of chemistry in 15 the fuel thermomechanical area. More so, I think, 16 some of the source term guys probably deal with that 17 more than we do.
18 So, it's largely going to be what the 19 data, what comes out, what's shown, what models can we 20 develop from that? We don't really -- so far, we 21 haven't heard anything that's going to require 22 significant changes to how we currently do the 23 thermomechanical analysis.
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79 1 will have a very different behavior that we'll need to 2 consider.
3 But so far, we haven't seen anything 4 that's going to fundamentally significantly change how 5 we do our review.
6 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Hopefully, this 7 corrosion and surface -- chemical effects on the 8 surface of the fuel will be slow developing and can be 9 catch as it happens.
10 MR. PORTER: Yes, that's what we're 11 expecting. I think the one area is the FeCrAl, we've 12 noticed the two different types of oxidation layers 13 that can form.
14 That's going to be very different than how 15 we've handled it with Zirc oxide, but other than that, 16 we haven't seen anything yet that's been a concern.
17 MR. PROFFITT: Okay. I'm going to skip my 18 next couple slides, they're on each of our 19 capabilities, but they were really largely included 20 here for reference, in case folks wanted to dig more 21 into them. And they're also addressed in the project 22 plan, in the reference material.
23 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Since you put them in 24 --
25 (Laughter.)
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80 1 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, is FAST going to 2 be the new FRAPCON, FRAPTRAN --
3 MR. PROFFITT: Yes.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- tool?
5 MR. PROFFITT: Yes, it's the combination --
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: That's a clear 7 decision by the staff?
8 MR. PROFFITT: Yes.
9 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, because 10 sometimes I've asked that in the past and it is a --
11 I got a fuzzy answer. So, it's a clear answer that 12 FAST is the new form going forward?
13 MR. PROFFITT: Yes.
14 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, fine.
15 MS. GAVRILAS: We've got thumbs up -- this 16 is Mirela Gavrilas, Director for Safety Systems in 17 NRR. We got thumbs up from Ian as he was sitting down 18 that that is indeed the case.
19 MR. PROFFITT: Okay. So, I want to move to 20 Slide 11 --
21 MEMBER REMPE: Actually --
22 MR. PROFFITT: Go ahead.
23 MEMBER REMPE: Since you did put them in --
24 (Laughter.)
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81 1 clarification on your thermal-hydraulics slide, 2 because earlier, I brought up in prior meetings the 3 fact that, if we believe the claims of accident-4 tolerant fuel, you'll be in a situation in the core 5 where you have lost your control materials, but you 6 still have the fuel and you're going to have to re-7 flood.
8 And TRACE does not have that capability.
9 And so, is your plan to try and have something that's 10 either a MELCOR, TRACE -- you've got to have thermal-11 hydraulic feedback and consider the effects of boron 12 injection, or whatever they're going to do, unless 13 somebody does accident-tolerant control rods.
14 And if you, again, if you want to get 15 regulatory relief, it seems like you better understand 16 that situation. And I'm not sure that the DOE codes 17 or the vendor codes or your codes are doing that yet.
18 MR. PROFFITT: So, I think in the near-19 term, which is what we're really focused on here, now, 20 is we don't expect that to necessarily be an issue, 21 but certainly, in the longer-term, that would be a 22 consideration we would need to consider with some of 23 the more advanced, some of the longer-term concepts 24 that are ATF, where that could potentially become an 25 issue.
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82 1 But I think, for the near-term concepts, 2 we think our current suite of codes, with relatively 3 minor modifications, will be able to adequately 4 support the calculation we need to perform.
5 MEMBER REMPE: Okay, thank you.
6 MR. PROFFITT: Okay. So, our coordination 7 with DOE on advanced modeling simulation. So, the 8 project plan, again, which you guys have, acknowledges 9 that potential to leverage DOE's advanced M&S tools, 10 especially for the longer-term concepts.
11 But let me highlight a couple other 12 things, though. There was a recent targeted effort to 13 couple NRC's TRACE code with DOE's BISON fuel 14 performance code through MOOSE, an independent solver, 15 and that's given the staff a significantly greater 16 understanding of the DOE codes.
17 So, this is just to highlight a couple of 18 recent examples of where we've been interacting with 19 them.
20 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: This is a comment, 21 which you can choose to ignore. Coupling codes sounds 22 good, but it can create complications that I don't 23 think -- to the chance that you actually get something 24 out of it, in terms of feedback, is important.
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83 1 excuse my words, willy-nilly. Because it just creates 2 -- it could create a nightmare, in terms of the 3 ability to do a timely calculation, I won't use the 4 word quick and simple, but I'll use the word timely 5 calculation, to understand what's going on.
6 MR. PROFFITT: Yes, I would say, to your 7 first point, it was an exercise for us to become more 8 familiar, to have better understanding, and to 9 increase our knowledge of the DOE systems. So, that's 10 largely what we used it for.
11 We've also combined elements of -- oh, go 12 ahead.
13 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: And all I was going to 14 say is, I'm not trying to say the tools are not 15 appropriate, but sometimes, it's the connection that 16 can cause an issue, not the individual tools, which 17 could be quite robust.
18 MR. PROFFITT: Yes. So, we've also 19 successfully combined elements of DOE codes under the 20 CASL program and NRC's neutronics code, SCALE.
21 These efforts have demonstrated that 22 specific opportunities exist to leverage elements of 23 DOE codes to improve the NRC's analysis capabilities.
24 So, we expect to continue to follow and continue 25 coordination with DOE.
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84 1 And onto the next bullet, to this effect, 2 we've been coordinating with CASL on a focused ATF 3 effort. This came out of, I think, the same 4 appropriations bill that John was mentioning.
5 They had directed DOE to -- in the FY18 6 Omnibus Spending Bill, the CASL language includes, 7 quote, collaboration with the NRC to evaluate the use 8 of high fidelity modeling and simulation tools in the 9 regulatory environment.
10 And so, CASL has chosen to center this 11 collaboration on ATF. And so, they had proposed a 12 program plan with some specific milestones and they 13 provided that to the NRC for feedback.
14 We've provided them feedback on those 15 milestones and we think it will end up being very 16 valuable. So, we're actively working with DOE on 17 that.
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, let me ask you a 19 loaded question there, is there actual experimental 20 data that you can do what you just said?
21 MR. PROFFITT: Is there --
22 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I heard from her 23 question that a lot of this would be potentially 24 empirical, requiring experimental data. So, my next 25 question is, if I get even more resolved in time and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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85 1 space, do I really have the experimental data to know 2 what I'm doing is right?
3 MR. PROFFITT: So, that's currently 4 underway. DOE is working with the vendor partners to 5 produce data. They have experiments going on in ATR 6 1 and ATR 2, and I see some DOE folks, I don't know if 7 they want to add any more. But there is data 8 acquisition going on now, absolutely.
9 So, we actually have a kickoff meeting to 10 discuss some of these milestones and some of the 11 highlights are listed there in the sub-bullets on the 12 bottom.
13 But one of the big things is, awareness 14 for our end-users. Our staff in the Office of 15 Research have largely been following these DOE 16 advancements in modeling simulations. So, bringing 17 some of this acknowledgment into NRR, the staff that 18 will be performing these reviews.
19 One, to be aware of the capabilities for 20 potential adoption, but also, aware of the 21 capabilities for any use that the vendors or others 22 may seek to use them for. So, it'll really help to 23 increase our awareness and understanding of the 24 capabilities.
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86 1 quantification and documentation of the BISON models 2 for ATF concepts.
3 So, once of the big things here that we 4 could do, while we may not adopt a DOE-sponsored code 5 for near-term ATF concepts, we may be able to steal a 6 model from their code and incorporate it into our 7 code. So, that may be very well -- or use the way 8 they model a code to sort of judge how a vendor may be 9 modeling that phenomena in their code.
10 So, even if we don't fully adopt a DOE-11 sponsored code, there still could be great benefit to 12 staying involved in that.
13 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, let me pursue 14 that, to make sure I understand. Because what I hear 15 you say in a different manner is, you would establish 16 with the vendors or the DOE or some team a set of 17 standard problems that you would work on, to see where 18 the uncertainties are, at least if I were to design 19 it, where the uncertainties are, where I need 20 empirical data.
21 Because I think Joy's point is quite 22 important, that without the data that would either 23 drive you to an empirical model, whether it be normal 24 operation corrosion or oxidation under elevated 25 temperatures, you'd almost need, like, a set of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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87 1 standard problems that you focus on and work on, to 2 see where the uncertainties are. Am I getting close 3 to what the plan is?
4 MR. PROFFITT: So, I don't know that we've 5 fully proposed that in this area. We have, I think, 6 have some proposals for that in other areas. And I 7 don't know if anyone else wants to jump in to 8 supplement my knowledge in that area, but that's 9 certainly a good concept.
10 MEMBER REMPE: So, as you've mentioned 11 earlier about, well, there's data coming from those 12 ATR tests, most of that data will have to be cook and 13 look obtained data, which means there's additional 14 uncertainty.
15 And I would just be careful about trying 16 to fine tune a bunch of models to something that has 17 additional uncertainty in it, is a concern also I 18 have.
19 MR. PROFFITT: Okay. Some of the other 20 areas that we're looking is benchmark problems for ATF 21 and transition cores.
22 And one of the areas here would be in 23 neutronics, where if the DOE could use their codes to 24 do sort of a benchmark problem or sample problem and 25 the NRC tool, which is much simpler and has the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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88 1 methodology, has certain assumptions and limitations, 2 if we could use that as a sort of benchmark, to give 3 us a feeling that our methodology is appropriate, 4 giving the high fidelity nature of the DOE codes, in 5 that certain circumstance.
6 Some of the other areas, still on this 7 same slide, is the development and demonstration for 8 longer-term ATF concepts.
9 And one of the highlights there that I 10 wanted to add is, it goes back to sort of one of our 11 decision making tools for using our codes for near-12 term is that they're very tailored to the regulatory 13 requirements and very easy to use for the staff.
14 And so, one of the things that the DOE is 15 looking at doing here is improving the post-processing 16 to incorporate fuel design limits during normal 17 operation and AOOs and things like that. So, that 18 would make it potentially easier for us to adopt in 19 the longer-term.
20 So, basically, just to summarize some of 21 the things that I've said there, and it may be 22 repeating a bit, but get us up to speed on the 23 capabilities of the codes, adopting models and NRC 24 tools and sort of providing a warm fuzzy feeling that 25 our methodologies are good in certain areas.
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89 1 And then, also, for further consideration 2 in the longer-term adaptation, these are certainly 3 very good steps. And all these steps are just in the 4 next year.
5 So, this was authorized, I think, in 6 August 2018 and will go through August 2019. And so, 7 we think these milestones that are laid out in the 8 CASL program plan will go a long way in our 9 coordination and help both sides get further along 10 this continuum of moving towards potential use of 11 advanced modeling and simulation.
12 And I think that was my last slide.
13 Hopefully I didn't go too far.
14 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, thank you.
15 Members of the Committee, additional questions?
16 MR. SCHULTZ: Andrew, just on your last 17 point, where you're talking, last couple of bullets, 18 where you were talking about comparing the DOE codes, 19 much more complicated perhaps than the NRC tools, to 20 demonstrate or to see if you can continue to use the 21 NRC tools.
22 Have you thought those types of 23 comparisons through, so that if the comparison is 24 insufficient, you've got a program plan identified, to 25 address that issue?
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90 1 What I would think you don't want to get 2 into is, finding a result which causes you to feel 3 that you need to enhance the NRC code and then, you've 4 got parallel development ongoing, lots of resources, 5 lots of expense.
6 So, hopefully, you're thinking about, what 7 if these comparisons show, A, they're good to go, or, 8 B, if they're not good to go, what is going to be the 9 course of action?
10 MR. PROFFITT: Yes, absolutely. So, I 11 mean, it can be a very slippery slope going down that 12 path, but I think our specific objective here is in 13 the more neutronics area, more well understood, a 14 first principal code type area, where the DOE code 15 that would be very high fidelity, very specific.
16 And we expect that it will confirm our 17 methodologies and results, but that's sort of the very 18 tailored area that we're looking at doing it. But I 19 agree, I mean, I think we do need to consider --
20 MR. SCHULTZ: Just to be thinking, what 21 will you do --
22 MR. PROFFITT: -- what would need to 23 happen, yes.
24 MR. SCHULTZ: -- if you get into a 25 circumstance where questions arise?
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91 1 MR. PROFFITT: Absolutely.
2 MEMBER REMPE: So, I actually thought your 3 plan was very prudent and practical. Is ACRS going to 4 have any additional input on this? It says draft on 5 the document, what's the planned future of that 6 document and --
7 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I propose we take it 8 up at the end.
9 MEMBER REMPE: Okay.
10 MR. PROFFITT: Okay.
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Because I think John 12 also had some thoughts on that, too.
13 MR. PROFFITT: Okay.
14 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: But I would think 15 that's eventually where our input would fit in.
16 MR. PROFFITT: Okay.
17 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Anything else? Okay.
18 We're going to take a ten minute break, because we're 19 a little bit late and I want to keep us on track, 20 since I have so many illustrious speakers that want to 21 come in front and talk to us. So, back at 10:20.
22 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went 23 off the record at 10:11 a.m. and resumed at 10:20 24 a.m.)
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92 1 back together and let people settle in? Brandon, do 2 you need somebody to help you run it or do you want to 3 run the slides yourself? Christiana is being nice to 4 you. There's a fee. Okay, we're ready to go. So, 5 Brandon, you want to tell us about Kairos?
6 MR. HAUGH: Yes.
7 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, the floor is 8 yours.
9 MR. HAUGH: I appreciate that. So, Brandon 10 Haugh, Kairos Power. I'm the Director of Modeling and 11 Simulation, so the group that's responsible for the 12 safety analysis tools, development, validation, and 13 licensing.
14 So, we're going to go, a little 15 introduction to Kairos, we're a non-light water 16 reactor, advanced reactor company.
17 I'm going to give you a little bit of 18 introduction to the design and then, we'll talk a 19 little bit about some of the codes in terms for 20 license-basis event modeling, really focused mainly on 21 the ones that we're selecting from the more advanced, 22 newer tools out of the DOE programs.
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93 1 questions to those, but it wasn't the focus of the 2 presentation.
3 We always start all of our presentations 4 with our mission statement. So, Kairos Power's 5 mission is to enable the world's transition to clean 6 energy, with the ultimate goal of dramatically 7 improving people's quality of life while protecting 8 the environment.
9 So, we take that to heart in all the work 10 that we do at Kairos and we just wanted to share that 11 with the group here.
12 So, Kairos is a fluoride high temperature 13 reactor. So, it's an interesting combination of some 14 unique technologies. So, we like to think of it as 15 taking the best out of the three worlds, but we'll 16 leave that up to the judgment at the end of the game.
17 So, we're taking coated particle fuel, the 18 TRISO particle fuel, in a pebble form, in our reactor 19 design. So, we get high integrity fuel that survives 20 at very high temperatures.
21 We're combining that with a liquid 22 fluoride salt coolant. So, the salt coolant we're 23 using has a lot of intrinsic safety characteristics, 24 in terms of being able to absorb fission products.
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94 1 from the start through the coolant.
2 And then, we're also a low-pressure pool 3 system, much like the sodium fast reactors. So, we 4 eliminate a lot of the kinetics from an accident 5 scenario by going to a low pressure system. Next 6 slide.
7 So, I'll just give you a brief layout, 8 since this is a open meeting. We'll give the loop 9 cartoon here. So, we have three loops in our system.
10 We have a primary loop, which has, of 11 course, the reactor pumps, a heat exchanger to an 12 intermediate loop. The primary loop is a FLiBe salt, 13 our own specification, but fluoride, lithium, 14 beryllium salt eutectic.
15 The intermediate salt in the intermediate 16 loop is a nitrate salt, very similar to the solar 17 salts used in concentrated solar array systems.
18 And then, the power conversion system for 19 the initial unit, we're looking at a steam conversion 20 system here. But unlike a traditional light water 21 reactor, this is a much higher pressure stream system, 22 much like a fossil fired plant would be.
23 A little bit on that one is that at the 24 end, in follow-on units, we predict as the maturity of 25 other power conversion system matures and utilities' NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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95 1 abilities to operate those, that there's a potential 2 to change out that power conversion system for other 3 types.
4 For the fuel system, we're taking 5 advantage of the TRISO particles, multiple fission 6 product barriers ingrained in the very small particle.
7 So, you've got the silicon carbide layers, the pyro-8 carbon layers, and also, the long-term diffusion 9 characteristics of all of that, at temperature.
10 Those are inside of a pebble, it's a 11 little bit of a unique pebble design. It's designed 12 to be actually buoyant in the salt, so it's actually 13 neutrally buoyant in the salt at normal temperatures.
14 So, it has a matrix, carbon matrix ore, 15 much like a graphite, surrounded by an actually 16 annulus layer of TRISO particles that are embedded in 17 a different type of matrix, and then, coated and then, 18 with a graphite on the outside.
19 So, this is a little bit different than a 20 traditional gas reactor type pebble form. And it 21 actually has a lot of enhanced performance 22 characteristics, in terms of very even fuel 23 temperature distributions, and the neutral buoyancy 24 gives us lots of good characteristics to be able to 25 handle and predict the pebble flow within the reactor.
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96 1 The particles do stay within the pebbles, 2 in the reactor. The transit time is in the average of 3 a couple of months. And of course, it does vary, it's 4 a little bit stochastic.
5 When looking at our safety case, the 6 design was really built around this combination of 7 inherent safety features. So, we take advantage of 8 the TRISO kernels and its multiple fission product 9 barriers. We take advantage of the salt coolant and 10 its ability to absorb fission products.
11 And then, we look at how that performs in 12 our cover gas systems for the noble gases. And then, 13 we have -- that system is within a reactor cavity, 14 which then is within a reactor building, and then, to 15 the environment.
16 So, when we look at the number of barriers 17 available, there are definitely many of them to count.
18 When we look at design-basis events, we're only going 19 to take advantage of the two main fission product 20 barriers and retention areas, and that's the particle 21 and the salt.
22 So, that's, when you look at DBAs, we 23 don't take a lot of credit for the building and all 24 the hold up, because we get such good performance out 25 of the kernel and the salt, in terms of fission NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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97 1 product retention.
2 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, what is the -- I 3 guess, the one thing I was expecting to see in the 4 cartoon is tritium and tritium control. Is it just 5 understood that it's there and has to be considered on 6 an operational basis and not an accident basis?
7 MR. HAUGH: Correct. It's an overall 8 management strategy for the entire operation of the 9 plant. So, we don't envision it being any different 10 during normal operations than it would be during an 11 accident, so that's why it's not called out here. But 12 it's an important part of the design of the plant.
13 With any lithium based salt, of course, 14 we're going to be producing tritium. Even -- no 15 matter how much we enrich the lithium seven, we're 16 still going to make tritium, so it's an inherent part 17 of the operational scheme.
18 So, when we look at a very unique design 19 like this, we have to take a fundamental look at all 20 the phenomena associated with that. It's not a 21 traditional light water reactor, the phenomenology is 22 significantly different.
23 So, much like we talked about earlier this 24 morning, with the PIRT process, we've engaged in that 25 early in the design, approaching it in a slightly NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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98 1 different fashion.
2 The initial PIRTs that we're doing 3 internally are purely phenomenologically focused, 4 based largely on disciplines. So, thermofluids, 5 materials, fuel, and salt.
6 And in the next iterations, we're going to 7 combine those in event space and combine them, and 8 they'll be looking at evaluation model PIRTs, at the 9 level of non-leak and leak type transients, 10 mechanistic source term, as well as materials 11 behaviors, because it's important in a high 12 temperature reactor.
13 So, when we look at safety-related code 14 development, I'm going to focus on kind of the four 15 main sets of codes that we look at. And you'll 16 notice, just like we talked about a little bit 17 earlier, this one doesn't address necessarily source 18 term migration out of the salt and into the 19 environment.
20 So, we're looking at existing tools to do 21 that, because they're actually fairly good and the 22 phenomenology, once we exit the salt, isotopes are 23 isotopes and as long as we understand the form that 24 they're in, they'll be transported similarly.
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99 1 question here, because -- so, is there, perhaps it's 2 company protected, is there an equivalent of what we 3 saw in John's overview, in terms of how to meet the 4 regulations and so, well, I don't want to say 5 regulations, but how to meet the design, the 6 alternate, the advanced reactor design criteria and 7 what tools are necessary?
8 Because this looks like a limited set, 9 compared to what we'd need. And your last comment 10 made me think that you have other things in mind. So, 11 is there an overall mapping of this that is available 12 or is it still Kairos proprietary?
13 MR. HAUGH: It's still Kairos proprietary, 14 we haven't released it yet, because we're still doing 15 some due diligence on it.
16 And part of that is, as a non-light water 17 reactor, we're submitting our PDCs, so our plant-18 specific design criteria that are adapted from the 19 advanced reactor design criteria, plus other 20 regulatory information.
21 And in that mapping, we'll follow our 22 PDCs. And so, you'll see a very similar chart, it's 23 just, we're waiting for the review of our PDCs, which 24 will be coming up in a couple of months.
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100 1 is, what I'll call a relevant list of the things we're 2 interested in, but not the complete list.
3 MR. HAUGH: Correct.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Nor a mapping of that.
5 MR. HAUGH: Correct.
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
7 MEMBER REMPE: So, I have a question that 8 probably applies to everybody, but I'll start with 9 you, since you're up here first.
10 MR. HAUGH: Okay.
11 MEMBER REMPE: You're planning to sell your 12 reactor to people in the U.S., as well as overseas.
13 We heard at our last meeting that DOE is going to 14 maintain ownership of the source code.
15 How will you -- I mean, okay, you might be 16 able to use these codes to get it licensed through the 17 NRC, but what's the long-term plan for a business 18 case, for using government-retained software to 19 another country, there may be export controls -- I 20 just, I'm puzzled here and it's not really an ACRS, 21 because we advise the Commission and the staff, but 22 I'm puzzled.
23 MR. HAUGH: I know, and I appreciate that.
24 And what I would say is, correct, that we are looking 25 initially at U.S. markets and potentially other NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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101 1 markets.
2 And how we're approaching the code, yes, 3 the DOE owns the code, but we'll have derivative 4 technology. And so, it's understanding that. So, we 5 have our own versions of these. So, we have KP-BISON, 6 KP-SAM, and --
7 MEMBER REMPE: And you will own those 8 versions and then, you can sell them to the world?
9 MR. HAUGH: It's an ongoing negotiation.
10 (Laughter.)
11 MEMBER REMPE: Okay.
12 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I think your initial 13 comment, this is interesting, but not our direct 14 concern, is --
15 MR. HAUGH: Correct.
16 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I'm fascinated, but 17 let's move on.
18 MR. HAUGH: Yes. Great. And yes, so this 19 is not the full snapshot of all the codes we would use 20 to do the entire safety analysis.
21 So, the idea when I prepared this was 22 focusing on the tools that we selected that relate to 23 the Department of Energy Advanced Reactor and 24 Simulation Programs, just to kind of tighten the 25 focus.
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102 1 And so, the important thing, I'll 2 reiterate the phenomenology here. So, we have a fuel 3 form that really doesn't release fission products if 4 it's an intact form, until above 1600 degrees Celsius.
5 The FLiBe coolant's boiling temperature is about 1430 6 degrees Celsius. And the coolant -- and its freezing 7 temperature is about 460.
8 Then, we have the materials. So, if you 9 look phenomenologically at high temperature reactors, 10 most of the safety and concern is actually around the 11 performance of the structural materials, because 12 they're the most challenged in terms of their margin, 13 to other types of phenomena, such as creep, creep-14 induced failure, and things like that.
15 And so, when we look at our combined 16 safety case, we try to focus on that. And so, you'll 17 see other codes come into play, really focused on 18 structural materials. And there's more that we're 19 evaluating beyond some of the list here, just to 20 reiterate that.
21 So, in the systems code model, we've 22 chosen the SAM code, developed out of Argonne National 23 Lab, and it is based on the MOOSE framework, like the 24 three top codes are on that list.
25 And we chose that for multiple reasons.
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103 1 The first one being, we're a single-phase plant in a 2 primary and intermediate systems.
3 And so, we didn't need the complexity of, 4 like, a legacy code that had spent a lot of effort 5 focusing on multi-phase flow phenomena. So, we have 6 a lot less to worry about in terms of disturbing the 7 code, when we're only focused on making changes for 8 single-phase salt.
9 The other thing is, it's a modern 10 programming language and in a modern programming 11 framework. And so, actually getting young, energetic 12 engineers who can rapidly get up to speed on the code 13 and also rapidly adapt it to our design was a factor 14 in the selection process.
15 As well as our ability to leverage the 16 community in the Department of Energy, which has a lot 17 of expertise in this area and has a strong willingness 18 to support industrial application of these tools.
19 So, with these tools, we recognize they're 20 not at a pedigree for licensing yet. So, we have code 21 development activities that are actually ongoing and 22 they're actually being co-developed with the labs.
23 So, we've identified phenomenologically, 24 in our first set of PIRTs, what we need to add to the 25 codes, based on what the code can do and based on what NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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104 1 our reactor needs it to do.
2 We developed a Code Development Plan and 3 we're implementing that right now.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Can you just remind me 5 what AGREE is? I know what PARCS is, what's AGREE?
6 Is this for TRISO fuel?
7 MR. HAUGH: Yes, it's for pebble bed or a 8 gas reactor. So, they have a hexagonal and a pebble 9 form, so it's the thermofluids part of a full 10 neutronics package. So, it's the thermal-hydraulic 11 aspect of it.
12 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: It's what you plug in 13 and take out TRACE?
14 MR. HAUGH: Yes. Yes, or other codes. But 15 it's just focused on the core, so for us, it's a 16 porous media approximation to the pebble bed.
17 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: But is it for both 18 transient and steady-state analysis?
19 MR. HAUGH: We're just going to be using 20 it, actually, for transient analysis. For steady-21 state analysis, we're using Serpent --
22 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, fine.
23 MR. HAUGH: -- which is actually a Monte 24 Carlo code, and then, we're actually coupling that, 25 the thermal-hydraulic feedback, to other codes. There NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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105 1 is a sequence there.
2 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay. Thank you.
3 MR. HAUGH: Yes. So, we're also going to 4 use BISON for fuel performance modeling. Now, the 5 initial BISON work was largely focused on light water 6 reactor modeling, but they've already begun the TRISO 7 implementation.
8 And we're accelerating the completion of 9 that, by taking the knowledge base and phenomenology 10 that's associated with what's in the PARFUM code and 11 implementing a lot of those material models and 12 everything into BISON, and then, using the solver in 13 BISON to complete the analysis.
14 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, well, I mean, this 15 is out of my -- source term is not my area of 16 expertise, but I want to make sure I understand. So, 17 there's -- the physics package that really is being 18 used and adopted is PARFUM?
19 MR. HAUGH: For the --
20 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Into BISON, which then 21 would --
22 MR. HAUGH: Partially. So, the empirical 23 closure models and material models are taken from 24 PARFUM, that have been developed for the AGR program 25 and the TRISO particles.
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106 1 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
2 MR. HAUGH: But the actual mechanics 3 modeling and everything is what's in BISON. And from 4 a source term standpoint, the isotopic inventory is 5 coming from really our steady-state physics code, 6 which is Serpent Monte Carlo code and its depletion 7 engine.
8 So, that generates the isotopic inventory 9 that we use to validate the isotopic buildup that we 10 put into the fuel particles in BISON.
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: But let me take it 12 through in a simple fashion, I think we have a couple 13 minutes. So, PARFUM has, we'll call it empirical laws 14 of inventory release as a function of temperature and 15 chemistry.
16 Now, as I take myself through potential 17 accident scenarios, best release is into the molten 18 salt. What is used in the molten salt, in terms of 19 fission product transport, then?
20 MR. HAUGH: Correct. And we're examining 21 either implementing fission product transport in the 22 salt, will be empirically modeled, in terms of the 23 chemistry.
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107 1 characteristics of all the isotopes or elements in the 2 salt.
3 And then, those will be implemented into 4 a systems code for the transport around the loop. And 5 then, we'll have to deal with the interfaces to the 6 gas areas, and potentially, if there's any wetting or 7 aerosols that are developed.
8 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: But if I put it 9 crudely, it's to be determined?
10 MR. HAUGH: Correct.
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay. That's --
12 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: You're going to 13 experimentally determine the solubility of every 14 single element on your salt?
15 MR. HAUGH: Every element that's 16 significant to source term.
17 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: And you have a plan to 18 do that? I mean --
19 MR. HAUGH: Yes. And we'll start doing 20 those measurements at the beginning of the year.
21 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: You, yourself?
22 MR. HAUGH: Yes.
23 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: It will be proprietary 24 data?
25 MR. HAUGH: Yes.
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108 1 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Will it be funded by 2 DOE?
3 MR. HAUGH: We're paying for it ourselves.
4 Okay. And the last one to focus on is, we've chosen 5 the GRIZZLY tool out of INL, which is an advance 6 structural materials modeling code, finite element 7 based, to use as a framework as we develop all the 8 materials models and creep models for high temperature 9 performance.
10 So, the team, the GRIZZLY team there is 11 extending from their traditional light water reactor 12 initial implementation into the appropriate modeling 13 for high temperature reactors.
14 And we're actually working across three 15 labs to develop material models. So, we're working 16 with LANL, Argonne, and INL to do that.
17 There's also a recognition that there are 18 environmental effects on the materials being in a salt 19 environment and so, we actually have to develop 20 environmental kind of aging models for the materials 21 as well.
22 And then, for core physics transients, 23 it's PARCS/AGREE. So, that's a nodal code, not 24 necessarily one of the advanced tools, but I thought 25 it was important to mention here, because that's also NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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109 1 at tool potentially the NRC could be using as well.
2 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: What's this -- do you 3 have control rods? How do you control reactivity?
4 MR. HAUGH: We have control rods, correct.
5 Yes. In various locations.
6 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Yet to be determined?
7 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Oh, no, I think it's 8 determined --
9 MR. HAUGH: Yes, it's --
10 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- yet to be talked 11 about here.
12 MR. HAUGH: Correct.
13 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Okay.
14 MR. HAUGH: Okay, thank you. And a little 15 bit about our development paradigm. So, we have a 16 full recognition, the amount of validation data needed 17 for a new reactor of this type is significant.
18 And we're invested in that from the day 19 one, when the company opened. It was actually 20 initially mostly testing focused. So, the first 21 people hired were, like, test engineers and things 22 like that, because those are the long-lead items.
23 So, we look at the conventional nuclear 24 development cycle, which has been lately maybe not so 25 successful, as very much a: do a lot of planning and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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110 1 a lot of design, but not very much building and 2 testing. It's expensive and, one, it's pretty hard to 3 get somebody over that threshold to go spend the money 4 on physical equipment.
5 We've taken it more in an accelerated 6 pattern. What you'll look at is, a lot of technology 7 development companies that have been more recently 8 successful have embraced this rapid iteration process.
9 And so, our process is very much the same: plan, 10 design, build, test, just keep rinse and repeat.
11 And we do this at various scales, starting 12 with simple, small materials that we can easily rapid 13 prototype using salts and heat transfer oils for 14 scaled analysis, and then, going all the way up to 15 prototypic components in a FLiBe environment at full 16 temperature.
17 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Just, so, I don't 18 understand the difference. I see the same four boxes, 19 you just --
20 MR. HAUGH: Yes.
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- made them look 22 three times --
23 MR. HAUGH: It's just, how much are you 24 going to do it. So, if you think about a large light 25 water reactor, how much did they ever build and test NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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111 1 in the last ten years?
2 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Oh, well, I mean, but 3 historically, you had Semiscale, you had LOBI, you had 4 LOFT, so --
5 MR. HAUGH: Exactly.
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
7 MR. HAUGH: And so, that, we're just 8 bringing that back to a non-light water reactor 9 technology.
10 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Oh, okay. All right.
11 So, they're regressing to the 1940s?
12 (Laughter.)
13 MR. HAUGH: Yes, but with enhanced 14 measurement capabilities --
15 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Which is how they did 16 it in the 1940s.
17 MR. HAUGH: Exactly, a little bit of brute 18 force, because we need the data. So, we learn a lot 19 about actually the component design as we actually 20 build the validation database as well.
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, let me, then --
22 okay. That helps me. So, are you already having 23 conversations with the staff, relative to the fidelity 24 and the scaling of the data you have to acquire, so 25 that once you acquire it, it's not going to have to be NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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112 1 reacquired?
2 MR. HAUGH: Correct, yes. So, the quality 3 assurance program is coming in for a review, and that 4 will directly address the test program as well. As 5 long as our scaling analysis approach will be 6 submitted very early next year for review.
7 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay. Thank you.
8 MR. HAUGH: And to accomplish that, we 9 actually have multiple facilities. We're co-located, 10 our headquarters in Alameda, California is actually 11 co-located with the R-Lab facility and also a nitrate 12 salt lab facility. So, it's 55,000 square feet of lab 13 space.
14 We actually moved in two months ago and 15 already started testing, component design testing.
16 That will transition into a salt lab that we're 17 constructing in another location. That's where we'll 18 handle the FLiBe materials. So, the beryllium, really 19 it's the beryllium hygiene is the important part of 20 that.
21 And then, we'll actually be testing 22 materials, corrosion, and characteristics of the 23 components on small scales at the salt lab, and then, 24 moving up in scale as we go to the test facility and 25 the user facility in longer-term.
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113 1 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: All of this is 2 intriguing. So, remind me the need for beryllium.
3 MR. HAUGH: Oh, okay. So --
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Because --
5 MR. HAUGH: -- it provides --
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- I know, at 7 university, one stays away from stuff like that, and 8 if I had an operating system -- so, explain to me the 9 requirement in the primary loop for the beryllium?
10 I've forgotten. I'm sure there is one.
11 MR. HAUGH: So, the beryllium helps 12 maintain the reducing environment, which it serves 13 several aspects. One, it preserves the materials from 14 corrosion characteristics, so it's not leaching ions 15 out of the structural materials.
16 Also, it provides enhanced capability to 17 manage fission products, such as iodine and things 18 like that, in that reducing environment.
19 And also, the eutectic salt has unique 20 optical characteristics. It's clear at temperature, 21 which allows us to do other inspections that are much 22 more difficult to do in other salts.
23 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: All right, thank you.
24 MR. HAUGH: This is just some propaganda.
25 (Laughter.)
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114 1 MR. HAUGH: That's our building we just 2 moved into, it's an old aircraft hangar on Alameda 3 Point. So, if you're ever out our way, give us a 4 shout.
5 And then, we have a couple snapshots there 6 of the high bay facility, where our integral effects 7 test that are non-salt based will be. So, we actually 8 will be doing some large scale ones in water and some 9 large scale ones using DOWTHERM heating oil.
10 And then, you'll see, the smaller skids on 11 those lower pictures there are actually our small 12 separate effects test facilities. These are ones that 13 are actually installed today. So, looking at 14 hydrodynamics, as well as heat transfer.
15 So, we had a small time slot here, feel 16 free to ask more questions. But basically, we're very 17 committed to the application and validation of 18 advanced modeling tools. That's what we kind of 19 wanted to take away here.
20 And to support that effort, we're 21 collaborating with the labs and the code owners at 22 those labs to accelerate the remaining development.
23 Our licensing plan for those codes is very aggressive, 24 so we aim to have significant amount of that 25 development done in the next 18 months.
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115 1 Comprehensive testing program will be used 2 to validate those tools for our application. And 3 we're definitely ready to work with the NRC and ACRS 4 to ensure a very transparent, ongoing interaction, to 5 have an effective and efficient review process.
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, thank you.
7 Questions by the Committee?
8 MR. SCHULTZ: So, I assume if you're using 9 these codes in the licensing arena, then these are all 10 being developed under an approved Appendix B-like 11 program?
12 MR. HAUGH: Correct. Yes.
13 MR. SCHULTZ: Okay.
14 MR. HAUGH: So, at Kairos, we have our own 15 software quality program, that's fully compliant with 16 Appendix B under NQA-12015, so the most recently 17 endorsed standard. And we'll be commercially grade 18 dedicating these codes from the lab.
19 So, the three main codes, actually, all 20 four of those codes on that list, are developed under 21 a QA program, it's just a different level of pedigree, 22 because we have to carry it the rest of the way, and 23 also the validation piece.
24 MR. SCHULTZ: And you're also doing 25 verification, if you're doing code modification?
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116 1 MR. HAUGH: Correct. Yes, our verification 2 program is very extensive. It's actually done on the 3 unit test level and on the integral test level. And 4 then, we do continuous integration testing with all 5 those changes.
6 MR. SCHULTZ: I'm thinking of verification, 7 with regard to the QA program, the modeling to the --
8 MR. HAUGH: Correct, yes. And so, the 9 modeling actually is implemented by multiple 10 developers. So, there's an implementer, a reviewer, 11 and an approver for all the models. And it also goes 12 all the way down in the actual coding itself.
13 MR. SCHULTZ: I would hope so, yes. Both 14 the coding, as well as the application of the model --
15 MR. HAUGH: Correct.
16 MR. SCHULTZ: -- element of verification.
17 Thank you.
18 MR. HAUGH: Yes.
19 MEMBER BALLINGER: How important is it for 20 you to control the potential in the salt? It comes 21 back to the beryllium issue.
22 MR. HAUGH: Yes. And it's important, not 23 super critical, I guess would be the best way to put 24 it.
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117 1 source term?
2 MR. HAUGH: It can.
3 MEMBER BALLINGER: So, there's a band that 4 you have to maintain?
5 MR. HAUGH: Correct. Yes, it's much like, 6 even in LWR, right?, you have a chemistry control 7 system, where you're going to be sampling and 8 maintaining within the range, to ensure that you're 9 within your validated safety-basis and also the 10 operational characteristics of the materials, that's 11 correct.
12 MEMBER BALLINGER: Thanks.
13 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Other questions?
14 Okay. We're going to move on, thank you very much.
15 MR. HAUGH: Thank you.
16 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: And we're going to 17 turn into an ATF discussion, and Zeses Karoutas?
18 Zeses is here somewhere. There he is. So, we'll 19 switch from the world of non-light water reactors back 20 to light water reactors with ATF fuel or cladding, or 21 both.
22 MR. KAROUTAS: Okay. My name is Zeses 23 Karoutas, Chief Engineer in Nuclear Fuel at 24 Westinghouse. And I'm going to give you a 25 presentation on our plans for using the DOE CASL and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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118 1 NEAMS tools. Next slide.
2 First, I thought it would be useful just 3 to give you a brief description of our accident-4 tolerant fuel, which we call EnCore, and describe some 5 of the benefits, the physical benefits, the safety and 6 economic benefits, just to give you an idea what 7 benefits we're talking about and how we will develop 8 models and implement and some of the tools that we 9 have.
10 And I'll also talk briefly about some of 11 the data needed for validation. And we need the data 12 to validate the models that go into the tools.
13 Talk a little bit about the CASL and NEAMS 14 tools to be used. The BISON code, which is going to 15 be a key code for us, in terms of for accident-16 tolerant fuel.
17 And talk a little bit about the VERA core 18 package for core simulation and also, applications for 19 RIA and DNB. And then, talk a little bit about CRUD 20 applications for an ATF core. And then, severe 21 accident analysis.
22 A little bit about the Westinghouse EnCore 23 product. We have, in terms of advanced cladding, we 24 have the chromium coated zirconium and also, in terms 25 of product evolution, after that would be silicon NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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119 1 carbide.
2 And then, for the advanced fuel, we have 3 doped pellets, which we call ADOPT. And it's doped 4 with chromium and aluminum. And then, for the future, 5 uranium silicide pellets.
6 In terms of implementation, we are in the 7 process of implementing the chromium-coated cladding 8 as lead test rods, with the ADOPT pellets in the 9 Byron-2 plant, Exelon plant. And also, we have a 10 segmented rod with uranium silicide pellets going into 11 those, some of the lead test rods.
12 And in terms of the physical benefits, the 13 ADOPT pellets, it's got a little higher density, about 14 two percent, and that helps for fuel utilization.
15 Better thermal stability and oxidation resistance, 16 lower fission gas release in transients, and increased 17 PCI margins at high temperatures.
18 The uranium silicide has a much higher 19 density, about 17 percent, and this really helps the 20 fuel cycle economics, for 18-month and 24-month 21 cycles.
22 Also, has improvement in thermal 23 conductivity, something on the order of five to ten 24 times, which really helps for transients. And so far, 25 from the ATR testing that we see, we see good NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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120 1 irradiation behavior, in terms of swelling and fission 2 gas release.
3 The coated claddings, it's coated with 4 chromium. It's got higher accident temperature 5 capability, something in the vicinity of 1300 to 1400 6 degrees C.
7 Reduced corrosion and hydrogen pickup.
8 It's got good resistance to rod wear. It would have 9 reduced exothermic reaction energy during high 10 temperature transients.
11 We've bone burst testing, it has reduced 12 balloon size and higher burst temperature, which could 13 help in terms of fuel dispersal.
14 We also would see improved LOCA PCT 15 margin, RIA deposition limits, and we're also looking 16 at the possibility of staying in DNB for a short 17 period of time.
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, I don't want to go 19 into the world of proprietary, but can I ask this 20 question? These benefits of the coated cladding, is 21 this irradiated claddings or is this unirradiated?
22 MR. KAROUTAS: Currently, it's 23 unirradiated.
24 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay. Because --
25 MR. KAROUTAS: In terms of --
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121 1 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
2 MR. KAROUTAS: -- like, for example, doing 3 burst testing. And of course, we will have to get 4 data, being irradiated in the future.
5 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, this is maybe the 6 wrong time to bring it up, but I can't think of a 7 better time. Do you have a plan for that now with the 8 Halden closure?
9 MR. KAROUTAS: Yes, we do. Of course, it 10 does hurt that Halden has shut down. But we're doing 11 our best, in terms of trying to perform testing 12 elsewhere.
13 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Is this something that 14 you would prefer not to discuss in public or can you 15 tell us about the testing plan there?
16 MR. KAROUTAS: Well, I do have a slide on 17 the --
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Oh, you do? Okay, 19 fine.
20 MR. KAROUTAS: -- testing and --
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, that's fine.
22 MR. KAROUTAS: -- I can give you a very 23 brief idea.
24 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: No, no, we can wait 25 until you get to that.
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122 1 MR. KAROUTAS: Okay.
2 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: That's perfectly fine, 3 thank you so much.
4 MR. KAROUTAS: And then, the ultimate 5 cladding is silicon carbide, and there, the big 6 benefit there is it's got no ballooning and bursting, 7 it's got a high resistance to rod wear. It's almost 8 have to worry about the spacer grid as opposed to the 9 cladding.
10 And it eliminates oxidation-drive 11 temperature spikes. We believe it has -- you can go 12 up to near 2000 degrees C, that's where it really 13 begins to decompose.
14 DNB and LOCA would be less of an issue 15 with this cladding. And we also believe it would be 16 a good fission product barrier at high temperatures, 17 in a severe accident. It would minimize the potential 18 for hydrogen generation to non-threatening levels.
19 Basically, we take all these benefits and 20 we're going to try to develop models and put it in our 21 codes, and that includes putting it in the DOE codes.
22 And this table here just kind of gives a 23 qualitative comparison of some of these benefits, for 24 the different designs here, relative to current fuel, 25 where the yellow signifies some potential benefit and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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123 1 the green is a larger benefit.
2 If you go from left to right here, coated 3 cladding with UO2 pellets, you have a certain benefit.
4 With ADOPT pellets, it would be more. With uranium 5 silicide, it would be even more. And then, with 6 silicon carbide would be the best.
7 MEMBER REMPE: On this table, where is it 8 that -- or do you have enough information yet to 9 really say, yes, the benefit's going to offset the 10 costs? Or is that going to be something, in your 11 opinion, it is very plant-specific?
12 MR. KAROUTAS: Well, we're working on this 13 and we're working together with EPRI on this ATF 2.0 14 program, to try to quantify the benefits.
15 We've also visited some of the plants, as 16 part of that program. We've got to a couple sites, 17 we've gone to the Vogtle site. And you are correct, 18 each plant's a little bit different and so, the 19 benefits will be based on that utility, what they're 20 interested in.
21 One utility may be interested in 24-month 22 cycles, for example. Another utility may be more 23 interested in flexible power operation. And that kind 24 of makes things a little bit different, in terms of 25 how you utilize the benefits. Next slide.
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124 1 In terms of the data, and maybe this 2 answers your question a little bit, Mike, this is the 3 type of tests that we need for validation. We've got 4 to do autoclave testing for these materials.
5 We have to get test reactor data and we 6 are going to other facilities, the MIT test reactor, 7 the HFIR, ATR, and we still getting some data from 8 Halden, even though the reactor is shut down, and they 9 still have a program, a three-year program to 2020, 10 where they are working with other facilities to try to 11 get data.
12 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I'm sorry, we're 13 talking other facilities within Europe?
14 MR. KAROUTAS: In Europe.
15 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: The Belgium reactor?
16 MR. KAROUTAS: Yes, like the BR2 --
17 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: BR2 is what I was --
18 MR. KAROUTAS: -- or Petten, as an example.
19 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
20 MR. KAROUTAS: So, I think we're --
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I apologize.
22 MR. KAROUTAS: Yes.
23 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Those are being 24 upgraded to accept the -- because I thought some of 25 those facilities needed some sort of upgrading to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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125 1 actually do this sort of testing.
2 MR. KAROUTAS: They do. They do, and some 3 of this does delay maybe getting some of this data.
4 But we do have a program here in the U.S., too. We're 5 basically trying to work with all the facilities we 6 can to get the data we need.
7 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
8 MEMBER BALLINGER: But not Bore-60? Not 9 Bore-60?
10 MR. KAROUTAS: Say that again, Ron?
11 MEMBER BALLINGER: Not Bore-60?
12 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Not the Russian --
13 MR. KAROUTAS: No. No, not the Russian, 14 yes.
15 MEMBER BALLINGER: Okay.
16 MR. KAROUTAS: So, in terms of other tests, 17 there's in-reactor exposure and really, that's getting 18 data from our commercial plants, in terms of PIE and 19 hot cell.
20 We're doing burst tests, unirradiated 21 power ramp tests. LOCA and RIA tests, with TREAT and 22 information from Studsvik. Fretting tests at our own 23 facility, including pressure drop.
24 We have the WALT Loop, in terms of looking 25 at DNB and CRUD impact. Ultra-high temperature and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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126 1 KIT tests, for severe accidents. And fuel mechanical 2 behavior type tests.
3 So, this just kind of gives you a rough 4 idea where all the test data is coming from.
5 MEMBER REMPE: So, at the last meeting, we 6 were told, actually, for the reactive insertion 7 valuations that, or the power ramping, it might be 8 better to do those at ATR. Is that --
9 MR. KAROUTAS: We'd like to see if we could 10 do it at ATR.
11 MEMBER REMPE: -- cycle and things like 12 that?
13 MR. KAROUTAS: That's correct. Yes.
14 MEMBER REMPE: Okay.
15 MR. KAROUTAS: So, now, getting into the 16 tools, this is a picture of the CASL and NEAMS tools.
17 And the main focus here, at least for us, is the 18 neutronics, MPACT, COBRA-TF, BISON for the fuel rod 19 performance, and chemistry with MAMBA, where we're 20 looking at CRUD impact.
21 And of course, a lot of these tools can 22 link up to other tools too, like we can link up to 23 RETRAN, TRACE, and RELAP7 for the system codes. CFD 24 codes, we've been working with STAR-CCM+.
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127 1 at, in terms of trying to get more advanced modeling 2 and simulation to help inform our design tools that we 3 have.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: But -- I'm trying to 5 come up with a way to ask this question. So, are 6 these the mainline tools or are these things you're 7 using for individual questions that you need to get 8 more detail and you're going to use the already, I'll 9 use the word preapproved Westinghouse tool set for 10 light water reactors?
11 MR. KAROUTAS: That's exactly correct.
12 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
13 MR. KAROUTAS: That's our plan. We're 14 really using these tools to maybe address some of the 15 key performance issues, look at trends, do 16 benchmarking with the tools that we have.
17 And of course, the BISON code, I think 18 will really help out, in terms of trying to do more 19 atomistic type of evaluations.
20 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
21 MEMBER REMPE: So, as preparation for this 22 meeting, someone sent us your -- and you weren't a co-23 author, so I hope I'm not hitting you by surprise, but 24 they sent us this top fuel CASL paper.
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128 1 talking about the fuel, it's like in Section 4 of it, 2 about the atomistic models, I'll see if I can find the 3 title of it here, it was the Fuel Rod Applications of 4 the CASL Tools.
5 And in there, it actually has a sentence 6 in there about how they're adjusting, the models will 7 be improved as more atomistic analysis of burnup 8 effects are completed and updated models are 9 incorporated into BISON and adjusted to best predict 10 available, measured data.
11 And I'm just kind of wondering what that 12 means, and maybe this is too detailed for you, but it 13 sounds like, despite the fact that we've gone to 14 atomistic effects in these models, that you're still 15 kind of tuning the models to the data, which, again, 16 if -- years ago, we talked about first order 17 principles and how you wouldn't have to -- you could 18 extrapolate those models and you could reduce testing.
19 But yet, they're still tuning the models.
20 And that means you have to interpolate. And do you 21 know what I'm talking about and do you have any 22 thoughts about this?
23 MR. KAROUTAS: Yes. At least this is the 24 way I look at it, first, you look at atomistic models 25 for current fuel that you have and you have a lot of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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129 1 data for, and you see how well those models work for 2 current, like looking at thermal conductivity 3 degradation in UO2.
4 And if you do well there, then you take 5 the next step and extrapolate outwards, say, for 6 uranium silicide type fuel, and see what kind of 7 behavior you get.
8 And then, you get some data on uranium 9 silicide, and you get a few data points, and you see 10 how it compares. And then, you inch your way up to 11 getting more data, more comparisons. And maybe you're 12 correct, there's still some empirical fittings.
13 MEMBER REMPE: It sure sounds like it.
14 MR. KAROUTAS: That's just my own opinion, 15 and I --
16 MEMBER REMPE: Yes, I understand. Again, 17 the staff will be looking at that more carefully.
18 MR. KAROUTAS: Right.
19 MEMBER REMPE: But it sure sounds like some 20 folks are still tuning to me.
21 MR. KAROUTAS: And the atomistic models can 22 really help out in terms of forecasting going forward, 23 maybe helping out in terms of defining the test 24 program that you need for getting more data. So, I 25 think it can be very helpful.
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130 1 MEMBER REMPE: Okay, thanks.
2 MR. KAROUTAS: Next slide. We'll be 3 focusing on the BISON code quite a bit, because, 4 really, that's the code that's going to be working 5 with accident-tolerant fuel.
6 And there, we'll be providing predictions 7 of expected fuel and cladding behaviors in advance of 8 measurement data, to inform design decisions. We'll 9 be looking at special performance issues for the code, 10 that may be our current codes can't handle in detail.
11 We'll be looking at performance thresholds 12 in the ATF material behaviors. And we'll be using 13 these results to help confirm and guide the 14 development of our own fuel performance codes.
15 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, let me ask this 16 question in this way, will BISON become W-BISON like 17 GOTHIC became W-GOTHIC? Or will BISON be general and 18 you'll use it and DOE will maintain it?
19 MR. KAROUTAS: I think, at this point, it 20 will be general and DOE will maintain it. But at some 21 point, there could be a point that we see a lot of 22 value in the code and it makes sense to submit it.
23 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: But not at this point?
24 MR. KAROUTAS: Not at this point.
25 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
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131 1 MR. KAROUTAS: And I also want to mention 2 that we are looking at the micro-reactors too, which 3 have a different kind of fuel geometry, and advanced 4 reactors, where a code like BISON may make a lot more 5 sense. Next slide.
6 Just to give you an example, we just 7 recently -- were putting some uranium silicide pellets 8 in the lead test rods going into the Byron reactor.
9 And we decided to make that a double-encapsulated 10 segmented fuel design.
11 And we looked at the eccentricity of the 12 uranium silicide pellet in this fuel rod, to look at 13 fuel temperatures and fission gas release.
14 And it just gave us a good feeling that 15 we're coming up with the right segmented rod design.
16 So, we just used this recently. And so, it was very 17 helpful to us. Next slide.
18 In terms of working with CASL and NEAMS, 19 these are milestones that they have in their plan 20 today. And so, we're working together with them, with 21 BISON and ATF Clad concepts for PWR normal operation 22 and LOCA conditions.
23 We're looking at the mechanical integrity 24 and thermomechanical behavior of the coated cladding.
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132 1 oxide fuel, the plasticity and thermal creep of the 2 doped oxide fuel. We're also looking at fission gas 3 and creep in uranium silicide fuel.
4 And so, there's quite a bit of development 5 going on, in terms of working together with CASL and 6 NEAMS.
7 We're also, for the lead test rods and the 8 lead test assemblies that are going in next spring, 9 2019, with the ATF materials, we are going to simulate 10 that core, the whole core, with the VERA tool package.
11 And we'll be comparing some of the results 12 to measurements. We'll be looking at the loading 13 pattern for the cycle of ATF introduction. We'll be 14 evaluating the results and comparing to our own core 15 physics tools.
16 We'll be looking at 24-month and higher 17 burnups. And this is something that some of the 18 utilities are very interested in, in terms of the 19 benefit of ATF, it can take us to 24 months and higher 20 burnups and be more economical.
21 So, we'll be using the CASL and NEAMS 22 tools for making those predictions. We'll be looking 23 at RIA --
24 MEMBER REMPE: In your interactions with 25 the staff, when you say -- I can get the thing about NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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133 1 the longer cycle length, but when you want to go to 2 higher burnups, it sure sounds to me like you need 3 Halden data to -- I mean, they were the only ones who 4 could do thermal conductivity degradation data.
5 MR. KAROUTAS: Yes, we still need -- you're 6 absolutely right. We --
7 MEMBER REMPE: Okay, thank you.
8 MR. KAROUTAS: In order to go to higher 9 burnup, and it kind of depends what burnup you're 10 talking about, our peak rod burnup now is 62,000. I 11 think as a next step, we're looking at, say, near 12 67,000. And then, another step, to go up to 75,000.
13 So, we can get data as we go. And so, that's what 14 we're looking at.
15 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Is the intent to --
16 because you had mentioned, and I can't remember now, 17 there's already chromium coated cladding lead test 18 rods being irradiated now? Or to be? That's what I 19 can't remember now.
20 MR. KAROUTAS: Yes, they go into the core 21 the spring of 2019.
22 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: With UO2 or with 23 U3Si2?
24 MR. KAROUTAS: They go in with uranium --
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134 1 pellets.
2 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay. All right.
3 MR. KAROUTAS: And we do have a segmented 4 rod, which will have uranium silicide pellets.
5 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: And then, the thought 6 is, there -- you don't have to go back to your 7 experimental slide. But the thought is, there, you 8 would take them out, section them, and then, do PIE on 9 them?
10 Would you do additional testing, LOCA 11 testing, in terms of what has traditionally been done 12 with, at some burnup levels, looking at essentially 13 ductility failure with QUENCH?
14 MR. KAROUTAS: Well, we are putting samples 15 in the ATR with the coated cladding and --
16 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: And that's what --
17 those are the rodlet samples that will be used for --
18 MR. KAROUTAS: And doped pellets, we're 19 also looking at uranium silicide and silicon carbide 20 in ATR.
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
22 MR. KAROUTAS: And eventually, we want to 23 take those and do LOCA and RIA testing.
24 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, fine. All 25 right. Thank you.
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135 1 MR. KAROUTAS: Okay. And just to give you 2 an example, we've been using the VERA tool package 3 for, for example, AP1000.
4 And these were all blind predictions, 5 before AP1000 started up, in terms of looking at hot 6 zero power calculations and hot full power 7 calculations.
8 And it's a heterogeneous-type core. We've 9 got many different rod designs, different lattice 10 geometries in the core, with different enrichments.
11 And the startup measurement comparison is 12 actually, were very good. In terms of boron and 13 isothermal temperature coefficient and rod worth, 14 they're very close. Closer than our current tools.
15 So, utilizing this actually helps us improve our 16 current tools.
17 If you go to the next slide, we also did 18 this with Watts Bar Unit 2 startup. And again, this 19 was a blind prediction too, and we were looking at the 20 measured minus predicted soluble boron during power 21 ascension testing. And this came up very close.
22 And again, this helped our tools.
23 ANC/PARAGON is what we use and so, it helped benchmark 24 some of the tools that we have. And we also compared 25 to the vanadium detector responses in the core, and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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136 1 that came out very close also.
2 We are looking at the RIA and DNB. And 3 for RIA, the uranium silicide has higher thermal 4 conductivity, which will be good in a transient, but 5 it also has a lower melting temperature compared to 6 UO2.
7 So, we want to look at different scenarios 8 with various rod ejection strategies and look at the 9 margin to melting for those transients. So, I think 10 the VERA tool package will help with that.
11 And we're also looking at the locked rotor 12 transient for DNB. And we'll be applying the tools 13 for that too.
14 This is just an example for AP1000, where 15 we've done a rod ejection analysis. And it was -- we 16 modeled the entire core, with MPACT and COBRA-TF, and 17 it performed very well.
18 It was very stable during the 19 calculations, with an expected power pulse resulting 20 from a super-prompt critical reactivity insertion and 21 the resulting negative Doppler feedback.
22 And then, the other area that we'll be 23 looking at is CRUD. As you know, with coated cladding 24 and silicon carbide, it's got a different surface than 25 our current cladding. And because it's a different NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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137 1 surface, that could have an impact on CRUD deposition.
2 And we are performing some tests and so 3 far, the tests look like the CRUD doesn't adhere more 4 than our current cladding. But this is definitely a 5 strong interest from customers, because having a lot 6 of CRUD deposition can give you CRUD-induced power 7 shift and could cause a lot of problems in the core 8 design.
9 And so, we'll be looking at that with the 10 MPACT, COBRA-TF, and MAMBA, which is part of the VERA 11 tool package.
12 And in here, we explicitly include the 13 feedback of boron on the power distribution. So, 14 right now, we're in the process with CASL of trying to 15 benchmark these tool to a lot of the data that we have 16 in existing reactors, but we want to also apply this 17 for the new ATF materials, which would have a 18 different surface.
19 And there could be an impact on DNB or 20 critical heat flux. And I think, based on pool 21 boiling, we see, you can improve critical heat flux 22 quite a bit by changing the surface. And we're trying 23 to do our testing in the WALT Loop at the reactor-type 24 conditions and flow rates, to see how that impacts 25 DNB.
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138 1 MR. SCHULTZ: So, you've been able -- these 2 examples are for current reactor fuel and CRUD 3 deposition?
4 MR. KAROUTAS: Right now, it's all current, 5 yes. But we'd like to also apply it for the ATF 6 materials, once we have good benchmarking with 7 existing plants or existing fuel.
8 MR. SCHULTZ: Of course, thank you.
9 MR. KAROUTAS: In severe accidents, there, 10 we've been using the MAAP code, so far, for these ATF 11 materials, looking at coping time benefits, and also 12 the use of FLEX equipment with ATF, for flow and 13 passive heat mitigation strategies.
14 And DOE, they've been using the MELCOR 15 code. So, we're trying to compare those results to 16 what MELCOR provides.
17 And we also need to be able to put the 18 latest ATF fuel mechanical behavior for these 19 materials at high temperatures. And that's kind of a 20 next step.
21 And I know CASL and NEAMS is working with 22 the NRC, with a TRACE/BISON, to try to link up those 23 two codes for LOCA capability. I think the project's 24 called Blue CRAB or something like that. And so, 25 we're very interested to see what kind of benefits you NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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139 1 get when you couple TRACE and BISON together for ATF.
2 So, in summary, we're thinking that these 3 DOE tools would definitely help us out, in terms of 4 benchmarking and informing decisions for the next 5 generation of advanced fuel designs.
6 And we are working on the eVinci micro-7 reactor, in Westinghouse, and also, the Lead Fast 8 Reactor too. And I expect that we're going to be 9 using the BISON code for those two applications. And 10 so, it should help out there.
11 And so, our process is really to take the 12 CASL and NEAMS tools and compare it to our tools that 13 we use today. And that's really our benchmark that we 14 want to do. Because the tools that we have are into 15 our reload process, they're very fast, and this is the 16 approach that we think is best, at this point.
17 And we're thinking the DOE tools could 18 also help with getting a better understanding of the 19 margin, and also the uncertainty. And so, we'll be 20 looking at the uncertainty, compared to the data that 21 we have.
22 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Questions by the 23 Committee? Okay. So, we're going to -- since it's a 24 Subcommittee meeting, we can potentially change things 25 around. We were asked by one of the -- thank you, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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140 1 Zeses.
2 MR. KAROUTAS: Thank you.
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Thank you very much, 4 Zeses. We were asked by one of the -- and this is 5 Nick Smith from Southern, that you have a change in 6 your travel plans.
7 So, if you want to come up now, we'll 8 bring you in front of lunch, since we've not had a 9 proprietary discussion yet. And then, we'll break for 10 lunch. So, after this presentation, we'll break for 11 lunch. It's all yours, Nick.
12 MR. SMITH: All right. I'm Nick Smith, I'm 13 a Principal Engineer at Southern Company Services, I 14 work in Advanced Reactor Research and Development, but 15 I am presenting to you today in my capacity as the 16 Chairman of the Molten Salt Reactor Technology Working 17 Group.
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, you're one of the 19 three chairs that Everett mentioned?
20 MR. SMITH: That's correct, yes.
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
22 MR. SMITH: And Everett did a great job of 23 kind of explaining the relationship. One thing to 24 note is that, we're not directly funded or tied to NEI 25 or EPRI or any other group, it's really an independent NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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141 1 group of vendors that have no affiliation directly 2 with NEI or any other working group like that. You 3 can go to the next slide, here.
4 This is a quick run-through of the 5 different companies that are represented in the TWG.
6 We have seven different reactor technology developers 7 and then, we also have participation from utilities, 8 like Exelon and Duke, as well as NEI and EPRI 9 attendants.
10 And I do want to say, I very much 11 appreciate all the logistical support that NEI and 12 EPRI have offered as we've been running through this 13 process. Next one, here.
14 So, there's a lot of different design 15 types in the MSR TWG. And I kind of plotted them 16 here, so you can see just the difference in fuel 17 cycles that you can go to with MSRs.
18 We have some thermal, thorium designs. We 19 have fast uranium designs. And every permutation in-20 between there. So, it's a lot of different 21 opportunities there.
22 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Kairos is not in it?
23 MR. SMITH: No, sir. The MSR Technology 24 Working Group is a liquid fuel technology group only.
25 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Oh, okay. Thank you.
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142 1 MR. SMITH: So, I just briefly want to make 2 sure I cover what each of these technologies is 3 focused on.
4 Terrestrial is leveraging the experience 5 of the molten salt reactor experiment, thermal 6 spectrum, graphite moderated, fluoride salt. If we go 7 to the next one, here.
8 TerraPower is a fast spectrum molten 9 chloride salt. It's an open core, there is no 10 moderator in there. Next one, here.
11 FLiBe is another thermal spectrum design, 12 but they are a thermal breeder. So, they're looking 13 at two-fluid thorium breeding in their machine.
14 Muons, Inc. is an accelerator-driven 15 molten salt reactor technology, thermal spectrum.
16 Next.
17 Alpha Technology Corporation is another 18 thorium-fueled breeder, two-fluid reactor.
19 And then, ThorCon is a company that's 20 based on a MSR, they're trying to leverage shipyard 21 construction techniques for their -- to lower costs.
22 And then, the last one here is Elysium 23 Industries, which is another fast spectrum chloride 24 salt design.
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143 1 can't come up with a better word, given the variety of 2 various concepts, is the working group -- well, let me 3 not -- what is the working group's strategy to deal 4 with that variety?
5 MR. SMITH: Well, we've got to stay 6 flexible. I mean, we engage with people where it 7 supports us as a group. There's a lot of different 8 angles that have to be approached, and we try and 9 leverage each other's experience, where it's possible.
10 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Well, let me ask my 11 question, then, more specifically. Is the working 12 group's, one of their objectives, to look for cross-13 cutting technical areas that require investigation 14 with a majority of these concepts? What I'm trying to 15 get at is, it seems like a lot of --
16 MR. SMITH: Yes. So, I've got a slide 17 coming up here.
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, that's fine.
19 Why don't we just --
20 MR. SMITH: This is the one you're looking 21 for. So, what do we work on? We work on things that 22 are generically applicable to all of us.
23 Regulatory issues, like functional 24 containment, something all of us want. Fuel 25 qualification, whether you're a thermal or a fast NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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144 1 spectrum core, that's going to be relevant.
2 We engage with DOE. So, we work with 3 folks like Lou Qualls, who's the National Technical 4 Director for the MSR Campaign. We work with Chris 5 Stanek in the NEAMS group.
6 And then, we also engage on consensus 7 standards. Stuff like the ASME boiler pressure vessel 8 code and the high temperature alloys that are in 9 there.
10 So, those are all different things that 11 everybody wants to be able to design their reactor 12 with, but they're not technology-specific, if that 13 makes sense.
14 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Sure. So, where in 15 this is source term?
16 MR. SMITH: Source term is in the end of my 17 presentation.
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
19 MR. SMITH: But that's definitely something 20 --
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: That's fine.
22 MR. SMITH: -- we're very concerned with.
23 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Then I'll wait. I'll 24 wait.
25 MR. SMITH: We'll just keep moving here.
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145 1 So, just wanted to give an overview of the 2 interactions we've had with DOE so far.
3 In April last year, DOE put together a 4 chemistry workshop for us, which was three days of 5 technical deep dive on chemistry issues associated 6 with liquid fuel MSRs.
7 And they actually broke it down into 8 analytical chemistry, computational chemistry, the 9 chemistry of fission products, and what I think would 10 be relevant for a source term calculation, and then, 11 also, materials and salt chemistry interaction.
12 They developed a paper off of that, and I 13 put the title in here, you can Google that and find 14 it.
15 And that has been used to lead up to an 16 NSF award on a molten salt center of excellence, 17 that's looking more at the scientific aspects of 18 understanding molten salts in nuclear applications 19 than the applied things that most of the developers 20 are looking at right now.
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: And this is an awarded 22 center of excellence?
23 MR. SMITH: Yes. Just very recently, in 24 the last few months.
25 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: And where is that?
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146 1 MR. SMITH: So, it's not one center, but 2 it's INL and Wisconsin, there's a few other groups 3 that are on the team.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: INL is the lead then, 5 if this is the one I'm thinking of.
6 MR. SMITH: Yes.
7 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
8 MEMBER REMPE: I have a question, since 9 we've interrupted you. If you go back to that slide 10 where you have the three circles?
11 MR. SMITH: Yes.
12 MEMBER REMPE: Are any of your, I don't 13 know what you call them, members, are they ready to do 14 a regulatory engagement plan with the NRC?
15 MR. SMITH: I think some of the members 16 have engaged with the NRC --
17 MEMBER REMPE: No, I mean a regulatory --
18 as part of the Licensing Modernization Project, we 19 have heard that the staff is trying to get a grasp, 20 because of all the diverse, different folks coming 21 forward.
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147 1 about how they're going to interact with the NRC to --
2 MR. SMITH: What are the white papers we're 3 going to deliver and when are the milestones that we 4 plan to meet?
5 MEMBER REMPE: Yes. Have any of them 6 gotten to that stage yet in their development 7 activities?
8 MR. SMITH: I know some of them are 9 developing that regulatory engagement plan very 10 seriously right now.
11 MEMBER REMPE: That's good, okay. Thank 12 you.
13 MR. SMITH: So, the other thing I wanted to 14 mention here is that we've had a lot of engagement and 15 support from the GAIN initiative.
16 Especially when they're able to come to 17 our meetings and we'll have developers asking 18 questions or bringing up topics that they don't know 19 much about, and GAIN has been able to tie them back to 20 folks inside the National Lab complex that have that 21 expertise.
22 And so, what ends up typically happening 23 is that the MSR TWG will have meetings, we'll have 24 presentations from people, and then, there will be 25 these offline conversations between specific NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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148 1 technology developers and the folks within the 2 National Lab complex that can help them work towards 3 a solution there.
4 We've also -- oh, hang on. So, we've got 5 a -- the establishment of the MSR Campaign, which, up 6 until two years ago, I don't believe we had any 7 designated MSR research inside DOE. So, this is a new 8 phenomenon, right?, it's a new thing. And we're 9 really excited about that.
10 And then, the last thing I want to make 11 sure I call attention to is the NEAMS software 12 workshop that was put on in February, or the end of 13 February, early March.
14 So, we had a lot of the developers asking 15 questions about the NEAMS tools, we had seen 16 presentations with kind of the results of modeling and 17 simulation done with NEAMS tools, but there wasn't a 18 clear on-ramp for the developers, how do you get 19 access to the codes, how do you learn how to use them, 20 because there's intricacies and subtleties to it that 21 you don't always get from reading a manual.
22 And so, the NEAMS team put on a three-day 23 workshop at Argonne, where everybody brought their 24 laptops or had connections to the Blues Cluster at 25 Argonne.
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149 1 And we ran, ran on our own, the 2 simulations that they had set up for us on different 3 types of MSRs, using PROTEUS and NEK5000 and SAM and 4 all of these exciting NEAMS tools that you've heard 5 talked about.
6 So, that was a really good thing. And 7 that's directly led to follow-on from the vendors, the 8 reactor developers, to work with NEAMS on the things 9 that they found that were really exciting.
10 So, we absolutely are planning on using 11 modeling and simulation as a part of the licensing 12 case for these different reactors, mechanical systems 13 codes, neutronics, thermal-hydraulics.
14 And as it's been brought up early, you've 15 got to have a V&V strategy around that. And I think 16 the big gap for MSRs is on experimentation. There's 17 a lack of data out there.
18 The thing I would say right now is, if you 19 go and survey all the seven MSR companies inside of 20 the MSR TWG, there isn't just one set of codes that 21 they're all saying they're going to use. Some of them 22 are going to use MCNP, some of them are going to use 23 Serpent, some are using SAM, some are using RELAP.
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150 1 V&V case behind one tool or set of tools, it would 2 encourage them to use that tool specifically.
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, let me ask you the 4 same question that I guess I asked the Kairos folks.
5 Let's forget about tools, let's just think about boxes 6 that need a calculation to get to the next box, in 7 terms of a plan, whether it be with what John 8 Monninger suggested, with what I asked of the Kairos 9 folks.
10 Does that exist for the molten salt liquid 11 fuel systems? That is, I'm going to have to determine 12 some reactor physics calculation, which leads to a 13 temperature or a density reactivity estimate, which 14 leads to a thermal-hydraulic estimate, which leads to 15 essentially a set of accidents or a set of transients 16 that I have to concern myself with about source term 17 release, which then leads me to another set of 18 calculations?
19 I'm looking for a logic diagram. Does it 20 exist for the molten salt reactors?
21 MR. SMITH: I know it does for some 22 companies.
23 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Is it proprietary or 24 is it something that the working group needs to do 25 regardless of the conceptual design?
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151 1 MR. SMITH: I think there's enough 2 differences between the designs of the companies that 3 they each need to do it individually.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, they don't feel 5 that there's enough commonality to do a cross-cutting 6 thinking process? This is a thinking problem that 7 doesn't need a code?
8 MR. SMITH: I think there's differences in 9 things like, are you going to have a sealed core for 10 the life of the run, where all the fission products 11 that are volatile are in the same area as your liquid 12 fuel? Or are you going to move those over to some 13 other off-gas area and deal with them separately 14 there?
15 And you start to look at design decisions 16 like that and how you're going to approach modeling 17 them and it's going to change your approach and what 18 tools you would select for that.
19 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay. So, you're 20 saying, there's enough diversity that, from a cross-21 cutting activity, the working group has not seen fit 22 to do this?
23 MR. SMITH: I mean, it's not the working 24 group's job to tell the developers how they should do 25 their design, right?
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152 1 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Oh, clearly, I would 2 never -- I'm sure, yes. Yes.
3 MR. SMITH: But --
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: But there's not a 5 consensus among the working group that this is common 6 activity that needs to be done by the working group?
7 MR. SMITH: Well, I think that, for 8 example, the need for a source term code is something 9 that has been clearly stated by the working group.
10 That's something that's on my takeaway slide.
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
12 MR. SMITH: But the fact that, right now, 13 if you try to go use MELCOR to model the source term, 14 mechanistic source term, for any of these MSR designs, 15 it's not ready and we don't have enough data, right?
16 That's a problem and we've got to address that.
17 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay. Thank you.
18 MR. SMITH: Okay. So, experimental 19 facilities. This is not specific to any one 20 technology, but I think there's some pictures in here 21 that I've borrowed from TerraPower, so I should 22 probably give them credit.
23 But the way most of these vendors are 24 approaching the collection of data that's lacking in 25 order to do accurate modeling and simulation is, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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153 1 first, with small scale separate effects tests.
2 Things like, on the very far left, you see 3 a micro-loop that's, like, a centimeter diameter 4 tubing with naturally circulating salt in it. And you 5 run that for a while, convince yourself that you 6 understand the chemistry interactions with the salt.
7 And then, you can go to something like the 8 next picture, which is, I don't know, a 20-GPM pumped 9 isothermal loop with inch and a half tubing, and get 10 some experience there.
11 And then, you go to something like an 12 integrated effects test, where you're coupling loops 13 together with heat exchangers and valves and you're 14 integrating in that off-gas system.
15 It's electrically heated, so there's no 16 radiation. Try and solve as many problems as you can 17 before you bring neutrons and gammas into the 18 equation, right?
19 One of the things that we've recently 20 identified as an area that we're lacking is the MSR 21 component ecosystem.
22 So, if you go to the vendors right now and 23 you say, I want to buy a 300-horsepower pump that can 24 handle 750 degrees Celsius uranium chloride salt, 25 they're going to say, we don't have that in stock, but NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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154 1 we can do an R&D project with you and over the next 2 few years, we might come up with an answer.
3 That's not going to lead to a healthy 4 molten salt reactor deployment timeline. And so, 5 something Southern has a history of doing is creating 6 these large component development facilities.
7 We did it a lot in the fossil energy 8 space, where things like mercury-capture technology or 9 carbon-capture technology, where you're at a skid 10 scale, you're going to bring it in to the plant, 11 you're going to try and run it with real flue gas, 12 it's going to break, you're going to have some 13 Brotherhood of Electrical Workers guy who presses the 14 wrong button at the wrong time and tears it up, and 15 you've got to repair it.
16 We need to go have those experiences as 17 soon as possible, with at-scale molten salt reactor 18 components: pumps, valves, heat exchangers.
19 In parallel to that, we need to also be 20 doing as minimum scale as possible criticality 21 experiments.
22 So, you've got a minimum diameter you can 23 get to for any of these things to go critical, but we 24 can do very low power experiments and verify the 25 neutronics and collect data on things like, I'm going NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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155 1 to use chlorine cross-section data as an example, 2 where there's a lot of uncertainty there, actually.
3 You look at the difference between in-4 depth databases on chlorine-35 capture cross-section 5 and it can change the reactivity of your core a few 6 hundred PCM, depending on which database you use.
7 So, there's obviously this need for 8 criticality experiments. And I think, the combination 9 of those with, I'm going to say, some explicit source 10 term experiments.
11 Can we take a few ounces of salt, put it 12 next to HFIR, cook it for a while, and then, dump it 13 out on a steel plate, with dissolved gas analysis, and 14 see what comes off?
15 Does anything of concern come off? Is 16 everything just staying bound up with these super 17 electro-negative elements like chlorine and fluorine 18 or do we need to be worried about some other things?
19 And I think that suite of experiments gets 20 you the validation basis you need to run the modeling 21 and simulations so you could go to a demonstration 22 reactor.
23 I'd say, for the first-of-a-kind 24 technologies, some people are talking about using the 25 test reactor framework, NUREG-1537, which I think is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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156 1 being reviewed by NRC right now. But there's other 2 companies that think they've got enough data --
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I'm sorry, can you say 4 that again, please?
5 MR. SMITH: The NUREG-1537 --
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Well, I'm sure we can 7 always find the number, but what was the thinking 8 process, I'm sorry?
9 MR. SMITH: So, there's some test reactor 10 that's the first time you're going to build the 11 integrated machine, right?, with a power cycle 12 integrated. And there's a pathway that NRC has that's 13 less constraining --
14 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, fine. I know 15 what you're talking about.
16 MR. SMITH: -- than a commercial reactor.
17 But you're not allowed to make a profit --
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, you mean a 19 prototype -- a prototype, is that your point?
20 MR. SMITH: I forget the word, there's a 21 specific word for it, but it's the less constricted, 22 you can make a profit off of this machine, pathway.
23 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Mirela?
24 MS. GAVRILAS: So, this is Mirela Gavrilas, 25 again. We're talking about NUREG-1537, which is the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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157 1 guidance for research and test reactors.
2 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
3 MR. SMITH: There we go.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Thank you.
5 MR. SMITH: Okay. So, a few other things 6 I wanted to mention here. When you go and start using 7 these DOE codes, some of them have really strong user 8 support, like you can go to SCALE training ten times 9 a year and there's a detailed manual, you can learn 10 everything you ever wanted to know about SCALE.
11 But some of the other codes that are still 12 in kind of a development phase don't have that 13 pedigree or that history behind them, so they're a 14 little bit more -- you've got to send an email or two 15 to get up and running for the first time.
16 In order for these vendors to be able to 17 use the codes, they've got to have a nice landing 18 point, where you enter into the system, you download 19 the code, you get access to it, and you learn how to 20 use it. And that's not always as fleshed out as the 21 industry would like it to be.
22 The other thing I want to say here is that 23 the V&V of DOE codes, I feel like the responsibility 24 is on DOE to pay to V&V those codes. And industry is 25 going to be building these experiments and --
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158 1 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: And what does DOE say 2 about that?
3 MR. SMITH: They've given me head nods in 4 the background so far, I don't think they've said 5 anything --
6 (Laughter.)
7 MR. SMITH: Yes. I mean, the point is, if 8 industry is going to be paying to do all of these 9 experiments, it makes sense that we collaborate 10 together and bring in DOE to get access to the data to 11 support the validation of their codes.
12 And I'd like to continue that public-13 private partnership in this space specifically, 14 because we're seeing a lot of success in areas where 15 you can have a technology developer in the driver 16 seat, as far as where are we going and what are we 17 trying to accomplish, and you fold in the National 18 Labs as teammates, not as work-for-hire.
19 And you don't have to tell them 20 explicitly, hey, we need you to go do X, they are 21 looking around corners for us in a lot of these areas, 22 and they really are acting like a teammate and not 23 just somebody who is, do the task and send the report 24 and forget about it.
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159 1 build with DOE going forward.
2 MEMBER REMPE: So, before you leave this 3 slide, would you elaborate on your last bullet a bit?
4 MR. SMITH: So, I think, the caveat that 5 all the developers asked me to put in here is that we 6 don't need these codes from DOE if they are not going 7 to accept the idea that we want them to V&V it and 8 they would go pay for it themselves or do it 9 themselves.
10 So, it's not an either/or, in terms of, 11 like, DOE has to V&V these codes or we can't get 12 licenses.
13 MEMBER REMPE: So, one probably needs some 14 sort of an analytical method. Does that mean that the 15 members of your group have their own backup software 16 that they're working on, that they're validating on 17 their own to bring in, to support any sort of license 18 they get from NRC?
19 MR. SMITH: I think all of the credible 20 vendors have multiple backup plans for every 21 technology concern that they're currently addressing.
22 So, there's not just one all or nothing, 23 if this doesn't work, then we're done, I think they're 24 maintaining backup plans. But there's an optimum 25 solution that they're hoping for.
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160 1 MEMBER REMPE: Okay. Thank you.
2 MEMBER KIRCHNER: But, can we explore this 3 a little bit more, because there are a lot of 4 implications in this. Let's say you're depending on 5 a code, therefore, it has to be a properly QA'd code.
6 And I'm thinking Appendix B.
7 Let me back up from the bottom of your 8 slide. Timing is an issue. For DOE, let's pick on 9 some of the more generic DOE codes. The one that 10 comes to mind is MCNP. It's kind of a workhorse, 11 benchmark type code for difficult problems.
12 What does it mean here, if I take that 13 next to the last bullet literally, DOE would pay for 14 MCNP to be validated against your criticality 15 experiments? Is that what you're expecting?
16 MR. SMITH: I think what I'm trying to 17 convey, and I guess poorly, here, is different than 18 that.
19 I would consider -- MCNP is not a 20 development code, in my mind. MCNP is a code that has 21 already been developed. And there might be tweaks to 22 it or little changes to how it operates that you would 23 need, but I wouldn't consider that a development code.
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161 1 and say, we need a whole new tool, brand new code, 2 from scratch, we're going to build it up with no 3 background on it at all.
4 MEMBER KIRCHNER: Well, typically, the 5 industry has taken codes that were derivative from, 6 once upon a time, AEC, also NRC and DOE, and then, 7 modified them and qualified them in the V&V sense, and 8 put them under a rigorous QA program.
9 So, I'm missing something here. This 10 would have to get very, very specific to suit your 11 needs in the licensing arena.
12 Typically, the DOE-developed codes are, 13 for lack of the right term, more generic, more 14 flexible, more workhorse kind of thing, that could 15 then be tailored to your specific needs. So, is that 16 your expectation?
17 MR. SMITH: The expectation is that the DOE 18 codes accurately model the physics and that a vendor 19 could take them and integrate them in whatever fashion 20 they need to to model their system.
21 MEMBER KIRCHNER: Right. And in your case, 22 then, you would have the responsibility to meet the 23 timeline necessary --
24 MR. SMITH: Yes.
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162 1 business case?
2 MR. SMITH: Yes.
3 MEMBER KIRCHNER: I don't think the slide 4 says that, or at least I'm misreading how you've put 5 the slide together.
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Yes, the way you 7 explained --
8 MEMBER KIRCHNER: It looks like, the 9 illustration on the left looks like, is it a black 10 hole or a cooling tower?
11 (Laughter.)
12 MR. SMITH: It's a cooling tower.
13 MEMBER KIRCHNER: Well, you could get into 14 that kind of issue. But in all seriousness, I think 15 you need to be a little bit more precise here and 16 realistic about expectations.
17 And when you say that you want DOE to pay 18 for the V&V, that means they have to go to Congress 19 and get those funds. So, this is not as simple as 20 just --
21 MR. SMITH: So, I --
22 MEMBER KIRCHNER: -- as you stated it here.
23 And doing it in a timely manner to suit your needs, 24 that's my concern.
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163 1 you advice that you can choose to accept or reject, 2 but -- since it's a bit off topic.
3 But I think Walt's point is that, what I 4 hear him say is, there's got to be a development plan 5 with potential exit ramps and entry ramps that DOE has 6 to be part of, I guess.
7 MR. SMITH: Absolutely.
8 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I'm trying to find a 9 better word, but it's a partnership, as you said, but 10 the words here didn't convey it. I think your 11 explaining to us helped me.
12 MEMBER REMPE: So, we advise the staff and 13 the Commissioners, not DOE, and my takeaway from this 14 is that, with respect to your technology working 15 group, it's not clear what you're planning to do with 16 the DOE codes and that we should make sure that the 17 staff and the Commission are aware of that.
18 MR. SMITH: It's an evolving story.
19 MEMBER REMPE: Yes.
20 MR. SMITH: Yes. Okay. So, only one slide 21 left on what we're missing. Completely captures all 22 the things that we're missing to make commercial MSRs 23 happen.
24 One of the things that we are missing is 25 a predictive chemistry code. So, this is something NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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164 1 where, obviously, as the liquid fuel burns, you're 2 going to have additional fission products that could 3 change thermophysical properties, change how the 4 source term would be affected.
5 And we don't really have a code that can 6 do that right now. This would be the equivalent of a 7 fuel performance code, but for molten salt reactors.
8 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, let me investigate 9 that. So, in the world of chemical engineering 10 technology for reprocessing, there are things like 11 that, I assume.
12 I'm looking at some of the folks in the 13 room, in the labs that have that, for salt systems, or 14 I'll call it -- so, is there something particular 15 that's missing here?
16 Is it basic chemistry data that's missing?
17 Essentially, chemistry potentials? What am I --
18 activity coefficients? I'm --
19 MR. SMITH: I think it's a combination of 20 things. There's the missing chemistry data, right?
21 I mean, we don't have a model that tells us how the 22 thermophysical properties change as you change the 23 chemistry.
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165 1 salt as it burns, but the effect on viscosity, when 2 you have a salt that's been burning for ten years, 3 that's a question.
4 And that backs up into your safety case, 5 because you designed your heat exchangers and your 6 pumps and all of your heat rejection based on some 7 heat capacity, viscosity, thermal conductivity, you 8 need to know what changed about those as the salt 9 burned up.
10 And if there's some chemistry management 11 you're going to do, I mean, we do a lot of boiler 12 feedwater chemistry management to prevent corrosion, 13 if there's something like that that you're going to 14 do, you need to understand the implications on that --
15 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, I'm with you 16 now.
17 MR. SMITH: -- with your chemistry.
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I'm with you now, 19 thank you very much.
20 MR. SMITH: The next one I've got listed 21 here is a couple --
22 MEMBER BALLINGER: Excuse me, but you're 23 not starting from zero.
24 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Right, that was my 25 point.
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166 1 MEMBER BALLINGER: I mean, the molten salt 2 reactor experiment, depends on how they control the 3 potential, there's data there. And one of the 4 original thermodynamic codes for calculating 5 speciation was developed for the molten salt reactor 6 experiment.
7 And I'm trying to remember the name of the 8 darn thing, but it's an engine which is used all over 9 the world now.
10 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: You're talking about 11 SOLGASMIX?
12 MEMBER BALLINGER: Yes. You got it.
13 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I think what he's 14 getting at is, there are assumed activity 15 coefficients, chemical potentials that have to be in 16 SOLGASMIX, so that you can do the calculation. That's 17 what I thought he was saying.
18 MR. SMITH: I think we've got to go do a 19 lot of verification of the salt properties --
20 MEMBER BALLINGER: Yes.
21 MR. SMITH: -- and take those measurements.
22 MEMBER BALLINGER: Because it really 23 depends on how you're controlling the potential. With 24 the MSRE, they used a U4, uranium couple. But others 25 will do -- beryllium is different.
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167 1 MR. SMITH: And for a fast reactor, it 2 would be different.
3 MEMBER BALLINGER: All right, thank you.
4 MR. SMITH: The next one is a coupled fast 5 spectrum neutronics and thermal-hydraulics transient 6 code.
7 I think today, you could go use VERA-MSR 8 and do a transient for a liquid fuel thermal reactor, 9 but there's been hang-ups on using that in the fast 10 spectrum.
11 And so, that's something that we're 12 already engaged with NEAMS on, but I figured it was 13 worth mentioning, because that's something that's 14 important to some of the MSR Working Group members.
15 And then, the third one you'll see listed 16 is the MSR mechanistic source term code. And that's 17 partly because, I think if you talk to the MELCOR 18 folks, they would say, there's not a bunch of code 19 aspects that are missing, but they don't have the 20 right models for the MSRs that you would need in order 21 to accurately do a source term calculation.
22 So, we've got to go do a combination of 23 experiments and I imagine there's some subtleties to 24 the implementation where there will be some tweaks 25 that are needed, to use MELCOR for that. So, that's NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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168 1 something that we've asked about, we're exploring, and 2 we'll probably be exploring much more aggressively 3 over the next year.
4 And then, I mentioned this earlier, but 5 salt irradiation experiment data. We can do a lot 6 with just the chemistry of the salt outside of 7 neutrons and gamma fields, but at some point, you've 8 got to get all three aspects of the chemistry at high 9 temperature with materials and radiation.
10 And so, those experiments are being 11 planned by different groups right now, but not all of 12 them have taken place yet.
13 And then, the last one, I think would be, 14 I put optimize, I don't know if optimize is the right 15 word or predictable would be a better word, but an 16 understanding of what it means to license an MSR.
17 When you go fill out your Safety Analysis Report, a 18 lot of understanding of what needs to be in that and 19 what the expectations are there.
20 MEMBER REMPE: So, the expectations vary, 21 whether they're going to go for a Part 50 or a Part 22 52. I'm guess you don't have any customers or sites 23 that you got to go for a Part 52, right?
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169 1 for the companies that are making the deal at the end 2 of the day.
3 But I find it hard to believe that for a 4 first-of-a-kind, you're going to be able to do the 5 entire design and bank on being able to construct that 6 and operate it at the start. You probably want 7 something that looks closer to a Part 50.
8 MEMBER REMPE: I would think so. The 9 prototype or demo or whatever you do first, yes, I 10 would think so, that might be on a government site or 11 something, I don't know.
12 But when you talk to the members, are they 13 knowledgeable enough they understand that? Because a 14 lot of times, I see a lot of the developers coming in 15 thinking they want to get a certified design right 16 off, and I think it's wise that you're saying, no, 17 it's very hard to do that with a first-of-a-kind. And 18 some of them are recognizing that and trying to think 19 along the Part 50 way?
20 MR. SMITH: Yes. Some of the developers 21 definitely have a dedicated licensing team and they're 22 very knowledgeable and hesitant to make any 23 commitments on a licensing pathway until they have a 24 lot more information and have had a lot more meetings 25 with NRC.
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170 1 Others are more technically loaded, in 2 terms of their staff, and so, there's not as much of 3 a background on licensing.
4 MEMBER REMPE: Okay. Thank you.
5 MEMBER KIRCHNER: Let me -- may I just 6 query you on your very last bullet? The -- I'm sure 7 you're following what the staff is doing, with their 8 Licensing Modernization Framework, with the generic, 9 so to speak, advanced reactor general design criteria, 10 et cetera.
11 So, are you expecting something that would 12 be optimized for molten salt or are you participating 13 with the, as an interested member of the public, with 14 the staff on how they go forward with their 15 technology-inclusive approach?
16 Because, at least what has been shared 17 with us, doesn't -- it recognizes that that's one of 18 the technologies out there, but it doesn't try and 19 optimize for an MSR. What are you asking for there?
20 MR. SMITH: So, I think, whether you use 21 the Licensing Modernization Project approach or not, 22 if you went and tried to fill out your Safety Analysis 23 Report for an MSR today, there would be gaps in the 24 ability for the applicant to be as effective as 25 possible.
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171 1 Things that they would second-guess about 2 putting in, that would probably lead to a lot of RAIs, 3 and so, I guess what I'm saying here is, being able to 4 have an open conversation about what should or 5 shouldn't be included in an MSR --
6 MEMBER KIRCHNER: Okay.
7 MR. SMITH: -- application, even if it's 8 using the technology-inclusive, technology-neutral 9 framework, would be helpful.
10 MEMBER REMPE: I was involved in another 11 conversation, actually, last week. And one of -- it 12 wasn't one of your members of your groups, but one of 13 the developers actually stated they thought the 14 Licensing Modernization Project was hindering them.
15 And I said, well, how could that be? I 16 mean, if you look at -- since you're from Southern, 17 it's just one option that's being proposed and I know, 18 from prior work I've done, that it could be helpful to 19 several of those developers.
20 And when it finally -- we started 21 exploring further, they finally admitted and said, 22 yes, I guess we need to have more of the different 23 technologies, micro-reactors or molten salt folks, 24 participating in some of these discussions, maybe 25 having a more active involvement by GAIN in those NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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172 1 discussions.
2 Would that help your group, if, again, you 3 were involved in some of these discussions? And is 4 that an area where maybe the staff needs to try also 5 and reach out more? Do you think there's a problem, 6 I guess, because I was surprised when the developer 7 stated that.
8 MR. SMITH: From my experience, the folks 9 in the MSR TWG that I'm interacting with are much less 10 focused on licensing and much more concerned with 11 engineering a safe and viable product.
12 And it's almost taken for granted that if 13 I really do engineer a safe product that can be 14 verified, that the licensing piece will happen somehow 15 or another. And that's kind of their stance.
16 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Or to put it 17 differently, you're far away from the need for 18 optimization at this moment, you have data gathering 19 and --
20 MR. SMITH: We've got a lot of work --
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- technology 22 development?
23 MR. SMITH: That's correct.
24 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
25 MR. SMITH: As someone from Southern, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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173 1 though, I do agree that the approach being taken by 2 the LMP is absolutely going to help expedite the 3 licensing process.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
5 MEMBER REMPE: Yes, that's what I would 6 think.
7 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay. Anything else?
8 MR. SMITH: That was it.
9 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Questions by the 10 Committee? Okay. So, we're going to take an almost 11 hour1.273148e-4 days <br />0.00306 hours <br />1.818783e-5 weeks <br />4.1855e-6 months <br /> break. We'll be back at 12:45 to begin with 12 Framatome. Okay?
13 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went 14 off the record at 11:50 a.m. and resumed at 12:46 15 p.m.)
16 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, why don't we get 17 started? We have our next presenter, Josh Parker, 18 from Framatome. Josh, welcome.
19 MR. PARKER: All right. Thank you.
20 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I think you were on.
21 MR. PARKER: Oh, I was on, there we go.
22 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
23 MR. PARKER: Sorry. Yes. Thank you for 24 your time today. So, I'd like to present Framatome's 25 ideas in terms of using DOE codes to support industry NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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174 1 implementation of advanced concepts.
2 We've got a little bit of ATF, advanced 3 fuels, as well as advanced reactors. We cover a 4 little bit of everything there.
5 So, just a background on Framatome 6 Innovation here, we often look at innovation in four 7 buckets, most of you all are familiar with this, near-8 term, short-term, mid-term, long-term, as you bring 9 things out to the market.
10 Clearly, one of the reasons we're here is, 11 we need to do something differently than we've done 12 before, or perhaps something we haven't done in a long 13 time, and that's what we're considering, in terms of 14 DOE codes and how they can be applied to bringing new 15 products to the market.
16 Framatome's future, up here in a couple of 17 bubble slides, we're looking at near-term ATF concepts 18 here of doped pellet, along with a coated clad. We 19 have advanced codes and methods that we are actively 20 pursuing with the NRC approval.
21 Looking at a greater than five weight 22 percent, as we start to head into some of the more 23 advanced concepts, such as longer-term EATF of silicon 24 carbide cladding or Lightbridge and a metallic fuel 25 product.
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175 1 So, these are kind of relatively where 2 they're at in our development phases here, as we look 3 at them.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Let me ask a question.
5 MR. PARKER: Sure.
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, within the French 7 fleet, is chromium-doped fuel, has ASN approved its 8 use or is it still in the process of being approved, 9 within the French fleet?
10 MR. PARKER: I'm not aware of the French 11 fleet. I do know that chromium doping has been 12 approved for use in the BWRs in the U.S. fleet, as 13 well as our German region has implemented the 14 chromium-doped pellets as well --
15 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
16 MR. PARKER: -- in their products. Our 17 French reactors tend to move a little slower.
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: And just to complete 19 my question, and I assume chromium-coated cladding is 20 still being tested, but not implemented in any -- are 21 there lead test rods in the French fleet?
22 MR. PARKER: There are not lead test rods 23 in the French fleet, there are lead test rods in other 24 reactors around the world, both in test reactors and 25 commercial reactors. And the first leads, in terms of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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176 1 U.S. fleet, will go in in spring of 2019, of this 2 year.
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay. All right.
4 Thank you.
5 MEMBER REMPE: When you say that there are 6 lead test assemblies somewhere in the world with the 7 chromium-doped cladding and the chromium-doped 8 pellets, it's together, it's not just the tubes in one 9 reactor test and the fuel in a different, you actually 10 have them together?
11 MR. PARKER: We actually do have them 12 together, yes.
13 MEMBER REMPE: Okay, good. Okay, thank 14 you.
15 MR. PARKER: On the chromium-doped pellets, 16 we've actually irradiated those for nearly 20 years in 17 different forms. The chromium --
18 MEMBER REMPE: With different claddings?
19 MR. PARKER: With different claddings, it's 20 really -- the newest thing is the chromium coating on 21 top of it. So, we --
22 (Off microphone comments.)
23 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Excuse me, I thought 24 I had a green light. If you're going to get to it 25 later, I'll just wait, where you're doing the testing NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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177 1 for the chromium-coated cladding?
2 MR. PARKER: So, ATR has some, both chrome-3 doped pellets and chrome-coated cladding.
4 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Yes.
5 MR. PARKER: Commercial reactor in Sweden 6 has that rod combination and the lead assembly. And 7 then, Vogtle has signed a contract to irradiate those 8 in spring of 2019.
9 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, thank you.
10 MR. PARKER: You're welcome. Just some 11 background of why we need to do things differently.
12 Historically, our product development is very linear 13 and sequential. Most product evolutions, in terms of 14 what we've seen in the market, take over a decade, 15 from the concept to the first implementation.
16 And this is with things that we already 17 understand, zirconium clad, UO2 oxide fuel, it still 18 takes us well over a decade to bring something to 19 market.
20 Just going down, and as you go, you go 21 from the concept to the design to the testing and the 22 validation, and you can end up in a cycle of where 23 your testing or your validation needs you to go back 24 and revisit your concept and come down.
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178 1 to the design requirements, the NRC review, and then, 2 you get to the market implementation out there.
3 What we're looking at is the potential 4 that the DOE codes could help streamline the process 5 and help us out in this, and maybe make this more of 6 a parallelized process, that we've kind of thrown up 7 here, of where it makes sense to help drive with 8 modeling and simulation the concept and the design 9 process, to inform your testing, so that you're trying 10 to compact the schedule here and bring new products 11 that are both safe and economical to the market, in a 12 quicker fashion.
13 So, our plants are aging out there, if we 14 want to make a difference, we need to get the product 15 out there sooner. So, we clearly see the benefit that 16 modeling and simulation can have in that design 17 process, as we move forward.
18 So, specifically, where we say the DOE can 19 help. In the near-term, our short-term on the chrome-20 doped and chrome-coated cladding, we don't need any 21 help with that.
22 We think it's an extension of our current 23 code suite. It's a zirconium product with a coating 24 on top of it, our extension of our current codes 25 should be applicable.
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179 1 We've had a large experience with dopants 2 in fuel, both in the United States, as well as in 3 Europe, with our background, so an extension of our 4 current fuel performance codes there, we feel is 5 applicable.
6 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: On the chromium-7 coated, have you made any CHF or CPR measurements?
8 Does it affect the --
9 MR. PARKER: The performance?
10 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: -- the performance?
11 MR. PARKER: We've done some pressure drop 12 type tests. We have not actually done a direct CHF, 13 because the CHF is done with stainless steel rods or 14 steel rods in a heater configuration. So, it's hard 15 to get your chromium in that configuration to do a 16 test.
17 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: But you have another 18 way to do it?
19 MR. PARKER: What's that?
20 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: You have any other way 21 to do it? Because CHF, the boil-off or the dry-out, 22 depends on how you wet the surface.
23 MR. PARKER: Yes, so we have done 24 wettability tests in the areas that we're able to do 25 that.
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180 1 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: So, you think that it 2 doesn't have a negative impact?
3 MR. PARKER: No, we do not.
4 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: It may have a positive 5 impact, then?
6 MR. PARKER: I think we're assuming if it 7 does have a positive impact, we're not taking credit 8 for it.
9 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: All right.
10 MR. PARKER: Mid-term effects, or mid-term 11 items that we're looking at, silicon carbide cladding.
12 We think that there could be some benefits here in the 13 modeling and behavior of the material, in the fuel rod 14 analysis codes. So, DOE could bring to bear some 15 benefits in that.
16 Metallic fuel in LWRs, clearly, the DOE 17 has a large experience base in terms of metallic fuels 18 and their performance, so they could bring benchmarks, 19 code-to-code comparisons, and codes to help aid the 20 design, in terms of implementation in an LWR.
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, I'm sorry that I 22 don't remember, metallic fuel in LWRs --
23 MR. PARKER: We're --
24 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Oh, this is 25 Lightbridge?
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181 1 MR. PARKER: This is, yes, this is our 2 Lightbridge --
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, is Lightbridge --
4 MR. PARKER: -- fuel product.
5 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: -- now wholly owned by 6 or this is a collaborative effort?
7 MR. PARKER: It's a joint venture between 8 Lightbridge and Framatome called Enfission.
9 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Ah, okay. All right.
10 MR. PARKER: Yes.
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Fine, sorry, I lost 12 the thread there. Thank you.
13 MR. PARKER: That's all right. So, looking 14 at these advanced products, we've got to go above five 15 weight percent. The DOE, having benchmarks, helping 16 us provide code validity up to the 20 weight percent, 17 some of the areas that we could potentially benefit 18 from.
19 MEMBER REMPE: So, my understanding of the 20 DOE codes, a lot of the times, they've gone into this 21 microscale or mesoscale stuff and they have, we were 22 told, even fundamentally different equations than 23 what's been traditionally in the vendor codes, as well 24 as the NRC codes.
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182 1 us, I'm a little concerned, because they can't give 2 all the data to validate those models for the 3 mesoscale stuff.
4 And so, I'm wondering -- I mean, it's, I 5 guess, okay if you want to get some insights, but when 6 you -- if you're starting to think about extrapolating 7 those codes, because you don't have high burnup data 8 for higher synth-enriched fuels, I'm just wondering 9 how that's going to work.
10 MR. PARKER: So, it goes back to the 11 discussion I said in terms of parallelizing the 12 process and using modeling and sim to inform.
13 We're not trying to take the place of 14 testing out there, but we're trying to inform the 15 design to stop or reduce the amount of iterations that 16 we might have to do.
17 So, if there's anything available that 18 helps us inform the design that says, this is a viable 19 design versus a non-viable design, before we get into 20 the expensive cost of testing and looking at higher 21 burnups or specifically what's happening on an 22 atomistic level of things, actually having models, 23 that's -- computer power's cheap, so let's use that 24 first, before we actually go out there and test, so we 25 can inform the product design cycle.
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183 1 MEMBER REMPE: Okay. Thank you.
2 MR. PARKER: Our long-term advanced 3 reactors, there's a smattering of codes being used all 4 over the industry.
5 This may be a little pie in the sky, but 6 if we can condense that suite or availability to 7 something that's industrial, easy to use, more robust, 8 and has benchmarked with DOE, like reactors, many of 9 the concepts out there come out of DOE-type reactors 10 that were developed in the 1950s and 1960s or 11 proposed, that would be very nice, I think, for our 12 advanced reactor community.
13 So, to help finalize this, places we see 14 that the DOE can help industry, clearly, in the area 15 of the silicon carbide claddings on the accident-16 tolerant fuel, DOE can provide the independent fuel 17 performance codes.
18 Metallic fuel in LWRs, definitely looking 19 at an independent code suite would help, to have, like 20 I said, before you have testing, if you have two codes 21 that are in agreement and may have different models 22 behind them, you have a higher confidence that your 23 design may actually make it to implementation.
24 Clearly, code-to-code benchmarking suite 25 would be very beneficial. We've used, in the past, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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184 1 the OECD/NEA benchmarks, anything like that that could 2 be developed would be of benefit, we find, to the 3 industry.
4 And clearly, on the advanced reactors, 5 consolidating that code suite down and helping to 6 reach a more industrial, ease of use concept, would 7 help in those conceptual and design phases up front.
8 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: This is kind of a 9 leading question, do you think, for this application, 10 do you think these codes, these DOE codes need to be 11 licensed by the NRC? Or are these only a helper to 12 you?
13 MR. PARKER: So, we could see potentials in 14 both of them. Clearly, and I'll get to it in my 15 conclusion, if there's a business case to actually 16 license the code, that would be something that we 17 would consider. But we actually view it, right now, 18 as possibly a helper, in terms of the design --
19 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: I wasn't asking you to 20 license it --
21 MR. PARKER: Yes.
22 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: -- but them to license 23 it. You could use their codes for these purposes 24 without any license, because you will run the tests.
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185 1 bringing to the NRC would be something that I would be 2 asking them to license, and whether that's a DOE code 3 or a self-developed code or a modification would be 4 --
5 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: No, the way I see what 6 you're proposing is, you use the code to scope your 7 design. And then --
8 MR. PARKER: Yes.
9 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: -- you test it on a 10 real experiment.
11 MR. PARKER: Exactly. So --
12 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: So, what you license 13 is the experiment, not the code.
14 MR. PARKER: Well, we still have codes that 15 we're going to license. We license our fuel 16 performance code, in order to get to the end product.
17 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: But those, you will 18 use with the results of your experiment, you would 19 fine tune your existing codes to the final data.
20 MR. PARKER: Yes. We'd clearly benchmark 21 against experimental data, in order to justify those.
22 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Okay, just asking.
23 MR. PARKER: Yes.
24 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, I guess, I 25 understand qualitatively what you're saying, I'm still NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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186 1 struggling as to, if I put it in its simplest terms, 2 for short-term ATF, you see no need for anything other 3 than the safety analysis tools you already have, that 4 you either are thinking of asking for NRC permission 5 or already have NRC approvals for use?
6 MR. PARKER: That is correct. So, we would 7 ask for extensions of those --
8 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
9 MR. PARKER: -- current tools to the new 10 materials.
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: And then, in the 12 second category, well actually, not the second 13 category, in the category of silicon, SiC-SiC, I think 14 I know what that stands for, one is fiber, one is 15 embedded stuff --
16 MR. PARKER: Well, it's often considered a 17 sandwich, but, yes.
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Fine, whatever.
19 MR. PARKER: Yes.
20 (Laughter.)
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: For that, that's a 22 long-term goal that requires still a good deal of 23 experimentation. So, I sense computer tools can be of 24 help, but until I have the experiments, I can't put 25 the cart before the horse.
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187 1 So, what are you saying there? Are you 2 saying that you can use current DOE calculational 3 tools to help design the experiments?
4 MR. PARKER: That is clearly one area that 5 they could help, yes.
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, give me an example 7 of a tool that is robust enough to do that.
8 MR. PARKER: Currently, we have used CFD to 9 help inform some of our testing, in terms of vanes on 10 our grids.
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Ah, okay.
12 MR. PARKER: So, help design --
13 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: But I'm --
14 MR. PARKER: Now, you're going back to the 15 fuel performance aspects.
16 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Yes, I'm not going to 17 let you off the hook.
18 MR. PARKER: Yes.
19 (Laughter.)
20 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I want, I guess I want 21 you to name names, if they exist, in these three 22 bullet areas, because I see where you're going, but if 23 it's something that has yet to be determined, that's 24 fine, I just want to understand, is it still in flux?
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188 1 flux, I think their capabilities, we still have yet to 2 take a deep dive on some of them --
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, fine.
4 MR. PARKER: -- to make sure that they're 5 ready.
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
7 MR. PARKER: But if you want me to name 8 names, BISON, MARMOT, there's things that are out --
9 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, those are the two 10 that you're thinking of, that would fit as an 11 experimental design tool?
12 MR. PARKER: Exactly. NEK5000, in terms of 13 thermal-hydraulics, CFD --
14 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
15 MR. PARKER: -- yes.
16 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
17 MR. PARKER: Yes.
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Thank you.
19 MR. PARKER: You're welcome.
20 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, well, I'm not done 21 yet.
22 MR. PARKER: Okay.
23 (Laughter.)
24 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, there happens to 25 be a tool that Framatome is developing with CEA called NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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189 1 ALCYONE. So, I'm surprised you're not picking tools 2 that are already part of the mix that Framatome has 3 with your partner, CEA, and EDF. Can you explain?
4 MR. PARKER: I will say that as the U.S.
5 market, sometimes we're not aware of what is going on 6 between Framatome in France --
7 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Seriously?
8 MR. PARKER: -- with EDF and CEA.
9 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, fine.
10 MR. PARKER: Yes.
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: All right. Okay.
12 Thank you.
13 MR. PARKER: I would say, that's the first 14 time I've heard that tool.
15 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
16 MR. PARKER: Yes. So, in conclusion, 17 basically, we use a business case philosophy. So, in 18 regards to the DOE tools, we look at it and where it 19 best fits and meets our needs and can help us in the 20 development project to help us bring technology to 21 markets, we'll use it to its best advantage.
22 Clearly, the more advanced they become, we 23 need the DOE to engage the industry and make sure that 24 they're focusing their R&D in those efforts as well, 25 and not just wasting time in other places that may not NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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190 1 benefit us in the U.S. nuclear fleet.
2 MEMBER REMPE: So, my takeaway, since our 3 job is again, to advise the Commission and the staff, 4 is that the tools may be helpful for you, as you do 5 things, but right now, it's unclear whether you're 6 going to bring any of the tools to NRC at this time.
7 So, it's not clear that the NRC needs to jump on the 8 bandwagon yet.
9 MR. PARKER: The way that the NRC would see 10 these tools is in regards to, like I said, code-to-11 code benchmarks, where we'd probably bring in our own 12 code and we said, hey, the DOE ran these cases over 13 here with X code, we ran them with our code, show that 14 we get comparable results. So, in that case, we would 15 want the NRC to be familiar with what the DOE has 16 done.
17 MEMBER REMPE: But NRC, most likely, would 18 be more familiar with your tool or you'd be bringing 19 in your tool for NRC evaluation of whether -- and 20 giving it some sort of Safety Evaluation Report, 21 right?
22 MR. PARKER: That is correct.
23 MEMBER REMPE: Okay, thank you.
24 MR. PARKER: You're welcome.
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191 1 members? Okay. Hearing none, I'll thank you guys and 2 we'll move on to the world of non-light water 3 reactors. And X-Energy, I think, is coming up.
4 Martin van Staden? Go ahead.
5 MR. VAN STADEN: Good afternoon and from X-6 Energy, thank you very much for the opportunity to 7 discuss some of our modeling and simulation needs.
8 We thought it important just to vie a bit 9 of background about our design, so that everybody 10 understands where we're coming from.
11 Look at introducing some of the safety 12 basis, because we believe that the modeling and 13 simulation is really heavily dependent on the safety 14 basis that we select.
15 And then, we'll go through some of the 16 physics that drive that and look at the neutronics, 17 thermal flow codes, and also, source term. And that's 18 probably, if I had rearranged this earlier, I would 19 have put source term first.
20 Just a note, obviously, there are a number 21 of other areas where we use safety-related codes, but 22 are not relevant to this Committee, such as structural 23 codes, et cetera, so we won't be discussing those 24 today.
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192 1 temperature reactor, using well proven UCO fuel that's 2 been developed in the U.S. What we see, 200 megawatt 3 thermal reactor, we're producing steam as our product, 4 so we can produce electricity from that or use it for 5 process heat.
6 So, those are just some basic parameters, 7 not going to drive through those in detail.
8 MEMBER REMPE: Excuse me, I had a question 9 --
10 MR. VAN STADEN: Sure.
11 MEMBER REMPE: -- when I saw this, and this 12 is probably just my lack of a good memory, but you 13 mention you're going to use the UCO TRISO fuel that's 14 been proven with a lot of the tests that were done in 15 the AGR program.
16 Did they do tests that would provide 17 insights to validate the performance of that fuel for 18 the type of transients that might occur if you're load 19 following?
20 MR. VAN STADEN: Not at this stage, and X-21 Energy is planning to do validation testing, 22 irradiation program with our fuel.
23 MEMBER REMPE: Okay. So, you'll be doing 24 that in the future?
25 MR. VAN STADEN: We'll be testing that.
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193 1 MEMBER REMPE: Okay, thanks.
2 MR. VAN STADEN: I think just maybe to 3 follow up on that answer, some of the AGR tests did 4 actually look at some design-to-fail fuel. And 5 currently, I don't believe that those tests are going 6 to be completed.
7 MEMBER REMPE: Well, isn't that, like, 8 where they irradiated an ATF and then, they took it 9 over to a hot cell and put it in a furnace? Or --
10 MR. VAN STADEN: Yes, so --
11 MEMBER REMPE: -- they didn't really bring 12 the power up and down in ATR?
13 MR. VAN STADEN: Yes, those tests have been 14 performed and we will be using that data and have been 15 using what's been coming out of AGR so far. As well 16 as historic data out of the German programs, that's 17 been available, there's a lot of data for that.
18 MEMBER REMPE: So, you're using the German 19 data?
20 MR. VAN STADEN: Yes.
21 MEMBER REMPE: Okay.
22 MR. VAN STADEN: So, what's really 23 important here, sorry for the header being cut off 24 there, is that our fuel provides the primary fission 25 product barrier. And I say primary, because we've got NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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194 1 multiple independent fission product barriers.
2 And what we see on the top left corner is 3 the UCO kernel, which is about 4.25 millimeters in 4 diameter there, really small, and that is coated with 5 a number of layers.
6 We have a buffer layer, the larger layer, 7 then pyrolytic carbon, silicon carbide, and outer 8 pyrolytic carbon layer. And these layers together 9 build up the key fission product barriers in the fuel 10 itself.
11 We've got about 19,000 particles in a 12 pebble. A pebble is about the size of a billiard ball 13 and it's got a fuel zone in the center, which is the 14 center 50 millimeters, and then, a five millimeter 15 fuel-free zone, which makes up the fuel element.
16 And then, we've got 220,000 pebbles that 17 fit in the core. What we see on the right-hand side 18 is the reactor and steam generator; reactor on the 19 left, steam generator on the right.
20 The pebbles are contained in the 21 cylindrical volume that is formed by graphite blocks.
22 The graphite, therefore, forms the core structures.
23 Pebbles are dropped in at the top, under gravity, and 24 they shuffle down to the bottom.
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195 1 pass of a pebble. We've got a multiple pass system.
2 We measure burnup when the pebbles get to the bottom.
3 If they still have life left, we'll put them back in.
4 And on average, recycle them about six times.
5 Very important to note that, because we 6 rely on the fuel quality and the barriers that the 7 fuel quality provides us, the fuel is really an 8 important aspect to understand and model.
9 And therefore, the analysis, one of the 10 analysis challenges for us is to predict accurately 11 the temperature of not just the pebble, but also, the 12 fuel in itself and all the different layers.
13 So, just from a high level down, and I 14 just wanted to go over what is the safety basis that 15 drives some of the codes that we'll be using to 16 support that.
17 And I've gotten the top, the safety 18 functions. And these are not all the safety 19 functions, they're the key ones relevant to 20 thermodynamics, neutronics, and source term. We've 21 got control criticality, control heat removal, and 22 control fission products.
23 And what we've got in the boxes below 24 those are some of the design features or design 25 selections that we've made, to try and support those NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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196 1 key safety functions.
2 Typically, design selections are things 3 like low power density, low excess reactivity, strong 4 negative temperature coefficient, et cetera.
5 Those are design features, they're there 6 by design in the amount and the quantities that we've 7 got them in there. Also, online refueling, very 8 important, because it gives us a very low excess 9 reactivity.
10 So, in each one of these safety functions, 11 if we drive them down, we're supporting them either 12 through thermodynamics analysis and thermal flow, or 13 neutronics analysis. And then, also, source terms.
14 And I mentioned, I didn't put source term 15 up front, because I've got a bit of a story to tell, 16 how we go from the center of the coated particles, all 17 the way out to the site boundary, and which analyses 18 will support that.
19 So, if we look at -- I mentioned fuel 20 temperature being very important and one of the key 21 drivers affecting fuel performance. So, in order to 22 model fuel temperature, we need to have a strong 23 coupling between the neutronics and thermodynamics.
24 So, that's a key physics coupling that we need.
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197 1 because of fission product buildup inside the kernels 2 and the pressure buildup in the coated particles. So, 3 understanding fuel depletion calculations is really 4 important in order to be able to predict burnup.
5 And then, obviously, fuel quality, and 6 we've got modeling in our source term code that really 7 looks at how we affect fuel quality in various 8 aspects.
9 And then, if we drill down a bit deeper 10 and we look at what factors affect temperature, it's 11 obviously the power, the power per coated particle and 12 the power per pebble. And so, that's very important, 13 we obtain that from neutronics codes coupled with 14 thermodynamics.
15 The heat transfer phenomena involved in a 16 pebble bed is an important aspect. It's a reasonably 17 irregular geometry, so we need to model that in a 18 great level of understanding.
19 And we're using CFD codes with simplified 20 porous media models and go into a bit of how we're 21 going to validate that with high fidelity modeling as 22 well.
23 And then, material properties play a very 24 important role in this whole process. Firstly, 25 because they're strongly temperature-dependent in most NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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198 1 cases, but also because they're affected by neutron 2 radiation.
3 So, especially graphite material, thermal 4 conductivity changes significantly over the life of 5 the graphite. And that's both the graphite of the 6 pebbles, as well as the graphite in the side 7 reflectors.
8 So, I'm going to start off with a summary 9 slide of the codes that we're using in various areas.
10 So, the first couple of rows show the neutronics-11 related codes and then, the thermal flow codes and 12 source term codes.
13 And what we have, we've had to rely 14 initially on a lot of legacy codes. We have a number 15 of key personnel that came out of the PBMR era and 16 we're actually trained out in Germany with the AVR 17 reactors. So, we had some of those in-house codes, 18 such as VSOP and MGT.
19 So, we've been using those for conceptual 20 design and they've been used to design reactors that 21 have run and also, the HTRP, and that will be in 22 operation, we hope, soon.
23 And then, we're looking at codes, 24 commercial codes, like STAR-CCM+, as thermofluids 25 code, and FLOWNEX Nuclear, which was also a code NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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199 1 developed out of PBMR. Both of those codes are NQA-1, 2 developed under NQA-1 Appendix B programs.
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: I'm sorry. Again, 4 which codes are developed under NQA-1?
5 MR. VAN STADEN: STAR-CCM+ and FLOWNEX, 6 FLOWNEX Nuclear.
7 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
8 MR. VAN STADEN: So, we're relying a lot on 9 those programs. In fact, we were involved in early 10 days with, even with CD-adapco with STAR-CCM+ to move 11 it towards getting NQA-1 compliance.
12 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Can you just remind 13 me, I'm sorry, I know the name, but I don't remember, 14 what is FLOWNEX again?
15 MR. VAN STADEN: FLOWNEX is a system 16 analysis code, so it's similar to, most probably PARC 17 or RELAP, is the easiest comparison.
18 And then, codes that we've been developing 19 in-house, from scratch, is our XSTERM, which is our 20 source term code. And I'll go through the various 21 components of that in one of the later slides. And 22 that looks at the source term from beginning to end, 23 and we'll elaborate on that in one of the next slides.
24 We've also been working with the DOE labs 25 and realize that some of the legacy codes, we don't NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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200 1 have the support that we might need in the long-term.
2 So, looking at the DOE, we've developed a 3 number of roadmaps in various areas. We have a 4 neutronics roadmap, source term analysis roadmap, 5 graphite roadmap, and a thermodynamics roadmap.
6 And then, we've used the insights of the 7 DOE labs and various people have contributed to that, 8 to help us understand which codes are available and 9 how they would best suit our deployment timelines.
10 And that's a very important aspect, 11 because there might be -- some people might say, well, 12 we've got a code that can do this or that, but there 13 might be only parts of those codes that are available.
14 And we've had to rely on something that we 15 can drive the timelines to be in line with our 16 deployment timeline. So, there might be some codes 17 out there that we haven't got on this list and we've 18 had to rely on DOE resources to help support us in 19 identifying those.
20 And maybe just as a clarification note.
21 We have grouped US/DOE codes, if you look at the 22 legend at the bottom, as the ones marked in red. And 23 I appreciate there's a lot of difference between maybe 24 a US/DOE code for NRC or that's a NEAMS code, but 25 we've just grouped those for this purpose as one set NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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201 1 of US/DOE codes. So, please don't crucify us for 2 that.
3 And then, the green, all the ones marked 4 in green are in-house codes and the blue bolded ones 5 are commercial NQA-1 codes.
6 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, it's your plan to 7 use things, use these tools -- I'm trying to 8 understand, so I should focus on, in terms of what you 9 want to use for safety analysis, the blue column?
10 MR. VAN STADEN: Yes. We're planning on 11 using -- and that's what comes out of our roadmap, is 12 primarily the codes in the blue column.
13 We are, and I'll show when we move to the 14 next slides, in some areas, using a parallel path, 15 where we are moving in parallel with legacy codes and 16 US/DOE codes.
17 And we're fully aware that some of these 18 codes need significant development work to be able to 19 achieve what we need them to achieve for a pebble bed 20 reactor that's got moving fuel.
21 So, that's what our roadmaps have been 22 developed for, is to really outline the gaps and 23 outline a plan on how we can achieve bringing these 24 codes to a point where they're usable and can support 25 our licensing process.
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202 1 And then, we've listed the NEAMS codes 2 there as well, and just to make clear, we are aware of 3 those. We currently -- the only one we're using 4 actively is NEK5000, through the support of Argonne, 5 who are helping us with our verification and 6 validation on our CFD codes.
7 But then, we've got the roadmap to develop 8 some of these others within the next three years, to 9 support the licensing.
10 So, if we move on to the neutronics 11 roadmap. As mentioned, we've been using VSOP-A and 12 VSOP-99, two independent versions of the German codes 13 that were developed independently.
14 These are quasi-steady-state codes that 15 perform the neutronics needed, as well as burnup and 16 fuel shuffling; really, a complete suite of codes in 17 that one code set.
18 And then, MGT looks at the transient part, 19 fast transients. As mentioned, these have got a 20 proven track record and we've used them for many years 21 out of the PBMR program as well.
22 And then, worked with the different labs 23 to develop our roadmaps, for neutronics specifically.
24 Also, getting the support from the University of 25 Michigan.
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203 1 And we've put together these roadmaps that 2 really help us drive the development work and we hope 3 to start in all earnest next year, with developing 4 these pieces of the codes that need to be enhanced to 5 support our neutronics work.
6 If we look at the thermal flow roadmap, 7 we've got two main needs for thermodynamic modeling.
8 The one is looking at detail components and systems.
9 So, whether it's the reactor system and the detail 10 components, core barrel, RPV, et cetera. And we use 11 CFD for that, and we've opted for commercial CFD 12 codes, STAR-CCM+.
13 And then, we've got the system level 14 analysis, which integrates all the components and 15 systems and does full primary/secondary loop analyses, 16 and transient mode. And that helps us develop our 17 control systems, our transient responses, and et 18 cetera.
19 And I mentioned both STAR-CCM+ and FLOWNEX 20 are NQA-1 codes. We're developing an in-house porous 21 media piece of user coding, that is linked to STAR-22 CCM+, to support the modeling of the pebbles 23 themselves.
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204 1 pebbles to the center of the pebbles, so that we can 2 actually integrate over the full domain and understand 3 what the center pebble temperatures are. And in that 4 way, we also can track the latent heat in the pebbles 5 as well.
6 MEMBER BALLINGER: So, I'm not a code 7 person, but I have some experience with VSOP. And 8 which one of these other codes can deal with the 9 moving core?
10 MR. VAN STADEN: Actually, none, at this 11 stage.
12 MEMBER BALLINGER: Okay.
13 MR. VAN STADEN: And that's a key part of 14 the roadmap, was to understand which of the DOE codes 15 would be best suited to add the moving fuel modeling 16 into it. And so, we've developed that and we'll most 17 probably be addressing that in a white paper with the 18 NRC staff.
19 MEMBER BALLINGER: So, none of these codes 20 deal with the stochastic nature?
21 MR. VAN STADEN: None of the present codes.
22 MEMBER BALLINGER: Yes.
23 MR. VAN STADEN: Yes, that is correct.
24 MEMBER BALLINGER: Which of the future 25 codes?
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205 1 MR. VAN STADEN: Let me just go back to 2 that. So, the future codes that we're looking at are 3 SCALE with SHIFT, PARCS and AGREE, and I think the 4 burnup in the moving core is done with ORIGEN and 5 MIXICLE. So, MIXICLE looks at the shuffling of the 6 pebbles.
7 So, these are pieces that we need to 8 develop and integrate into these existing DOE codes, 9 for that capability.
10 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, I'm glad Ron asked 11 the question, because I just assumed. So, what is 12 MIXICLE?
13 MR. VAN STADEN: MIXICLE is the part -- so, 14 our pebbles are shuffling down slowly --
15 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: That part I've got.
16 MR. VAN STADEN: Yes. So, MIXICLE really 17 takes that into account in the burnup calculations.
18 So, you need to understand --
19 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: But the physical 20 location of them is based on what tool?
21 MR. VAN STADEN: Well, we're also doing 22 discrete element modeling. So, discrete element 23 modeling actually looks at the individual pebbles that 24 are shuffling through the core.
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206 1 in VSOP, are based on experimental testing that was 2 done by the Germans.
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay.
4 MR. VAN STADEN: If I understood --
5 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, there's an 6 empirical connection to the spatial location of the 7 pebbles?
8 MR. VAN STADEN: That's correct. And we're 9 using discrete element modeling to -- almost as a 10 validation tool to that, because we can actually 11 change core geometry slightly in the bottom and get 12 slightly different results. And we're using that as 13 an update to some of those correlations as well.
14 MEMBER REMPE: Again, my memory's not so 15 good, but I thought the South Africans funded some 16 tests too, with the pebbles --
17 MR. VAN STADEN: Yes, we --
18 MEMBER REMPE: -- to try and show those, 19 where the pebbles were, how they were flowing down and 20 to validate some sort of software. Is this --
21 MR. VAN STADEN: Absolutely.
22 MEMBER REMPE: -- based on that, too?
23 MR. VAN STADEN: That's correct, yes.
24 Actually, one of the people working with X-Energy was 25 one of the engineers that was doing all those tests.
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207 1 MEMBER BALLINGER: I think I recall some 2 Japanese work, where they tried to make VSOP basically 3 a Monte Carlo code, and they gave up when they ran out 4 of computing power. They would have had the lights go 5 dim in Japan to run it. But I think that data's still 6 around.
7 MR. VAN STADEN: Okay. I'm not aware of 8 that, thank you.
9 So, just to get back to the thermodynamic 10 modeling. We're following a multilayer approach, 11 which we see on the right-hand side.
12 So, we want to be using a porous media 13 model that's got empirical model in there for modeling 14 the heat transfer on pebbles, because that's a fast 15 running code. We need to do long-term transients that 16 take ten to 100 hours0.00116 days <br />0.0278 hours <br />1.653439e-4 weeks <br />3.805e-5 months <br />.
17 So, running explicit models of a pebble 18 bed is not really feasible. So, we're using detailed 19 RANS models and LES -- RANS meaning Reynolds-averaged 20 Navier-Stokes, which is a typical CFD code, using one 21 of those turbulence models embedded in the codes -- to 22 understand some of the flow phenomena.
23 And we'll be validating that using higher 24 fidelity models, such as LES and NEK5000. And then, 25 as we go higher fidelity, we unfortunately most NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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208 1 probably will need to reduce the size of the domain 2 that we'll be modeling.
3 And we're really making a lot of use of 4 the labs, Argonne, as well as Oak Ridge, to support us 5 in those two areas.
6 MEMBER KIRCHNER: Are you going to have a 7 number of internal control rods in the pebble?
8 MR. VAN STADEN: We actually do have 9 control rods, and my apologies, I didn't point that 10 out up front. But our control rods go into the side 11 reflectors, so we don't --
12 MEMBER KIRCHNER: But they're in the 13 reflector, not in the core?
14 MR. VAN STADEN: Yes.
15 MEMBER KIRCHNER: Okay. So, that's a 16 design decision you already made.
17 MR. VAN STADEN: Absolutely.
18 MEMBER KIRCHNER: Okay.
19 MR. VAN STADEN: Yes.
20 MEMBER KIRCHNER: That simplifies this 21 challenge.
22 MR. VAN STADEN: Definitely. Finally, the 23 source term calculation chart, and my apologies, this 24 is a bit of an eye chart, but I think it's an 25 important chart, because it really brings together the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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209 1 majority of the modeling and simulation that supports 2 our safety case into a summarized chart, to put it 3 that way.
4 So, if we look on the left, we have these 5 little pictures. The first one there being a coated 6 particle.
7 And so, we've developed our source term 8 code, XSTERM, and it will model each one of these 9 steps, from the coated particle, all the various 10 mechanisms for fission products to migrate coated 11 particles, intact particles, as well as assumed failed 12 particles.
13 Then, we go through into the pebble matrix 14 and the graphite surrounding the coated particles, we 15 refer to as pebble matrix. So, there's a certain 16 retention ability of the matrix graphite as well.
17 And then, we go into a level, which we 18 term circulating activity. And that's within the 19 pressure boundary, so the gray there is the pressure 20 boundary, which circulates.
21 And the top three are effectively your 22 normal operation cases, where you don't have any 23 failure of the pressure boundary.
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210 1 pressure boundary, we look at transport of all the 2 fission products in the building, and finally, I 3 wouldn't use the C-word, I'd use the F-word, the 4 functional containment building, to then track the 5 fission products to the site boundary.
6 And then, what we see in the various 7 columns is just various isotopes, and by no means are 8 those the only ones we track, I've just listed a 9 couple.
10 The states in which they come out:
11 gaseous, metallic, dust particles. The various 12 mechanisms involved. The physical phenomena that get 13 to be modeled there.
14 And then, the various codes involved in 15 that. And as we can see on the right-hand side, the 16 various codes, it's really a significant number of 17 codes that we use to actually validate source term.
18 Our source term code, which we started 19 developing about three years ago, we feel is really an 20 important part of our safety basis, because it really 21 models everything from the coated particle all the way 22 to site boundary.
23 So, we looked at various pieces of codes 24 that are available in DOE and there are pieces, like 25 BISON, that we can be using and we will be using some NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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211 1 of those for validation or benchmarking calculations.
2 But XSTERM can model everything in one 3 suite, so that really helps us to do fast analyses and 4 evaluation of different scenarios in a single code.
5 MEMBER REMPE: So, when I look at the 6 phenomena, I don't see anything about water ingress or 7 air ingress phenomena, is that going to be covered by 8 XSTERM or MELCOR?
9 MR. VAN STADEN: Yes. We do cover air 10 ingress and water ingress, as well as, in our case, we 11 believe will be beyond-design-basis events, but --
12 MEMBER REMPE: You have that capability?
13 MR. VAN STADEN: Yes.
14 MEMBER REMPE: That's good.
15 MR. VAN STADEN: In summary, as mentioned, 16 we needed to rely a lot on legacy codes and we'll, 17 especially for conceptual designs, we'll continue 18 using those as we don't have anything else in our 19 arsenal at this stage.
20 We're moving out on exercising these 21 roadmaps that we've developed with the DOE labs, to 22 make sure that we can get some US/DOE codes that are 23 capable of doing what we need.
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212 1 timelines. We want to be commercial and at a certain 2 stage and we need to, therefore, take charge of that 3 and drive those to fruition as soon as possible.
4 I think we really want to emphasize that 5 we can't do this on our own, we need a strong 6 commitment from the DOE and the various labs, to help 7 us complete this, if we want to get these codes up and 8 running in time to also achieve what we believe the 9 DOE timelines are for deployment of advanced reactors.
10 And finally, I think collaborating with 11 the NRC, as much as possible, early on and working 12 through some of these roadmaps to make sure that there 13 aren't disconnects in any of these, I think will be 14 very valuable to us as well.
15 Thank you very much.
16 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: And what is the 17 mechanism or plan that you have to obtain the 18 commitment from DOE?
19 MR. VAN STADEN: Well, we want to place 20 them under contract. So, in other words, contracting 21 to do the development for us.
22 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: You paying them?
23 MR. VAN STADEN: Unfortunately, at this 24 stage, this is the only option, we haven't had any 25 other funding opportunity.
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213 1 MEMBER REMPE: Okay. Back on Page 11, or 2 Slide 11, just to be clear, MELCOR isn't really a 3 US/DOE code, it's an NRC code, right?
4 MR. VAN STADEN: Yes.
5 MEMBER REMPE: And so, that will be 6 something you might want to consider there. And then, 7 do you have a regulatory engagement plan? I mean, I 8 assume you're thinking of a Part 52?
9 MR. VAN STADEN: We actually have got both 10 plans, a Part 50 and a Part 52, on our schedule 11 boards. So, looking at which plan will get us 12 deployed first.
13 But, yes, we have submitted a regulatory 14 engagement plan and we will be moving out with a 15 number of engagements in the next couple of months.
16 I think our next one is the 5th of December.
17 MEMBER REMPE: Thank you.
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: So, I want to make 19 sure, though, that I'm with you. That in the previous 20 summary column, you said what you want to use. In 21 this one, these look like primarily your tools, 22 supplemented by --
23 MR. VAN STADEN: Well, what I did mention 24 up in the neutronics, on the neutronics side, we're 25 going to run a parallel path for as long as we need NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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214 1 to.
2 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Okay, fine.
3 MR. VAN STADEN: Meaning that once we've 4 got a clear path to go with one or the other, we'll 5 most probably focus more on the one than the other.
6 But up until then, to mitigate risk, we've got a 7 parallel path.
8 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Thank you. Other 9 questions? Okay.
10 MR. VAN STADEN: Thank you very much.
11 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: All right. So, we 12 have -- our next speaker is at a distance. So, I 13 think we're -- Andrew Lingenfelter? Andrew, are you 14 on the line? Is Andrew supposed to be on the line?
15 MR. WANG: Supposed, I called him half hour 16 back and he wasn't on the line at that time. And I 17 told him we are earlier, so he should. But --
18 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: He knows to come on at 19 this time?
20 MR. WANG: He knows that 1:45.
21 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Oh, at 1:45?
22 MR. WANG: Yes.
23 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: Oh, well then, why 24 don't we take a ten minute break? Because I don't 25 want to sit here and look at each other --
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215 1 MR. WANG: I try to call him again, but he 2 don't pick up the phone.
3 CHAIRMAN CORRADINI: All right. We'll come 4 back in ten minutes.
5 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went 6 off the record at 1:33 p.m. and resumed at 1:43 p.m.)
7 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay. So, I'm trying 8 to check to see if our NuScale representative is out 9 there, Andrew?
10 Is Jacob DeWitte out there for OKLO?
11 MR. DEWITTE: Yes, I am.
12 MEMBER CORRADINI: Jacob, by process of 13 elimination, we're going to take you now so we don't 14 sit here looking for our NuScale representative.
15 MR. DEWITTE: That sounds good.
16 MEMBER CORRADINI: All right. So, why 17 don't you go ahead and we will connect up with our 18 NuScale folks in Oregon and they'll come after you.
19 MR. DEWITTE: Okay, thanks.
20 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay.
21 MR. DEWITTE: Do you guys have my slides 22 up?
23 MEMBER CORRADINI: We have your slides up.
24 You'll just have to tell us Slide 1, Slide 2 or next 25 slide, whatever you want, okay?
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216 1 MR. DEWITTE: Okay. Thank you so much.
2 MEMBER CORRADINI: And can you speak a 3 little bit louder, Jacob, please?
4 MR. DEWITTE: Yes. Is this better?
5 MEMBER CORRADINI: Yes.
6 MR. DEWITTE: Okay, great. Thank you 7 guys. And unfortunately, my voice is a little bit 8 hoarse so don't hesitate to do that. Between a cold 9 and the smoke from the wildfires out here I'm a little 10 bit, my throat is a little hoarse, so I'll try to 11 speak pretty clearly and loudly. But if you can't 12 hear me, please do interrupt.
13 So, first of all, thank you guys for 14 having me. I'm excited to talk to you guys today.
15 Sorry I had to be remote but between weather and some 16 other conflicts I wasn't able to make it to D.C., so, 17 appreciate you accommodating me for teleconference.
18 But basically, going to the next slide.
19 So, Slide 2. I'm going to talk to you today mostly 20 about fast reactor modeling and simulation tools and 21 sort of provide a perspective of the different 22 developers that are working on these technologies as 23 indicated by the Fast Reactor Working Group, which is 24 Chair.
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217 1 developers, as you can see, it's a pretty broad 2 spectrum of technology that's covered. And that's 3 kind of what's interesting about the modeling and 4 simulation discussion here, is because of the fact 5 that there is such a diverse set of technology with 6 various coolants and various fuels, ranging from 7 liquid metals to gases to salts as coolants, to fuels 8 being in the form of metallics versus oxides or 9 carbides or nitrides or even salts. You've quite a 10 bit of different consideration.
11 And one thing that we've seen is what that 12 looks like in terms of how different developers are 13 pursuing or modeling a simulation approach. And also, 14 the implications of that on a tool selection. As well 15 as the needs and the gas being identified. So I'll be 16 highlighting some of that today.
17 So this list, the developers you can see 18 as well as the utility members that we have in the 19 Fast Reactor Working Group, then also the general sort 20 of independent parties such as EPRI and NEI.
21 And also, we're excited that we have 22 supplier member here, including Studsvik Scandpower.
23 Which I'll mention briefly in terms of some of the 24 work they're doing. That could be beneficial to this 25 group as well.
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218 1 So with that, moving to the next slide, 2 Slide 3. From a developer perspective, yes, there's 3 different needs across the various phases of 4 development and commercialization, which other 5 speakers have talked about today and you've heard a 6 decent amount.
7 But going from the conceptualization phase 8 through design to licensing an operation, requires 9 different capabilities, different tools and different 10 codes.
11 And so, the focus I'll have today is 12 mostly on where licensing is with a bit of the 13 intersection between design. Because that's kind of, 14 I think, the topic of interest in where some vendors 15 or some of the developers are actually moving into.
16 And so, that will be kind of what I highlight.
17 Moving to the next slide. In terms of 18 fast reactor perspectives, there's various 19 phenomenology of interests across the design. This is 20 sort of amplified by the fact that the Fast Reactor 21 Working Group encompasses technology that's spanned in 22 quite a broad variety of different configurations that 23 are all sort of united by their operation in the vast 24 spectrum.
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219 1 various fuel cycle missions. Which range from long-2 lived cores to mission focused on used fuel 3 consumption to breed and burn operations.
4 Generally speaking, all of these systems 5 have a single-phase coolant behavior. So that's kind 6 of the driving thermal hydraulics similarity, which is 7 why when you'll see the thermal hydraulic codes being 8 used and considered, it's actually got quite a broad 9 set of overlap.
10 And then similarly, given the neutronic 11 nature of these systems, and the fact that they're 12 often generally very tightly-coupled core design, 13 you'll see that reflected as well.
14 One thing we're noting though is the fact 15 that some of these systems are operating, they're 16 smaller design, smaller core design, that might have 17 higher leakage components to what they do. So, that 18 can, in some ways, challenge some of the legacy tools, 19 which is why the advanced tools could be quite 20 important for what we can do.
21 MEMBER CORRADINI: Can I --
22 MR. DEWITTE: And then there is also --
23 yes.
24 MEMBER CORRADINI: Can I just stop you for 25 a minute, I want to make sure. So, under normal NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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220 1 conditions a single-phase coolant behavior, but in off 2 normal conditions, is it really clear for all range of 3 potential accidents that I'm going to stay single-4 phase?
5 MR. DEWITTE: No. And that's pretty 6 design dependent. But, you're right. In particular 7 you're going to have effects that come into play here, 8 especially in the severe accident phase where some may 9 want to look at that.
10 However, generally speaking for most 11 modern designs, and I say most because, again each 12 design has unique specific considerations. It's 13 pretty, you know, getting to the point of actual 14 sodium boiling, which is the main phenomena you see 15 for this spec coming into play, it's pretty unlikely 16 given the overall global feedbacks that are going on 17 across the rest of the system, as well as the 18 localized feedback to different fuel levels.
19 That said, this is where some of the 20 legacy tool capabilities are quite important, because 21 there are sodium boiling models in SAS4A and SASSYS 22 that are pretty important in terms of severe accident 23 analysis and progression.
24 That said, pushing some of these designs 25 though, even though severe accidents, you don't see NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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221 1 sodium blowing really occur, frankly at all, in the 2 accidents that they're looking at. But the 3 capabilities do exist for the design where that may be 4 relevant.
5 But that's kind of one of those areas 6 where some of the legacy tools still have an important 7 place to play, and will be used by some of the 8 developers.
9 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay, so let me say it 10 briefly to make sure. So, there are legacy, I think 11 the term you used was legacy, but we'll call it 12 already existing tools that take into account what 13 could occur under accident situations where I would 14 have, I come to saturation and have a boiling of the 15 liquid of metal?
16 MR. DEWITTE: Right. Yes.
17 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay, fine. Thank you.
18 MR. DEWITTE: Yes. Specifically tasked 19 for acceptance sodium boiling models, so yes.
20 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay.
21 MR. DEWITTE: And then just to make the 22 last little point here, then there are different 23 considerations considering we have three developers 24 working on a SASSYS fluoride system of the fluid fuel 25 considerations and what that looks like in terms of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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222 1 the integration from the multi-physics level in the 2 core.
3 With regards particularly to precursor 4 drift which can be an amplified importance for some of 5 the designs that have a plutonium consumption mission.
6 Just because you reduce your delayed neutron fraction, 7 you have a pretty fast neutron generation time, 8 meaning pretty short, so things progress more quickly.
9 And so you want to be able to capture those effects 10 accurately because that can have a significant effect 11 on your overall plant performance and safety analysis.
12 And so that's a gap that people are 13 working on and are starting to get closed. Thankfully 14 because of the tightly-coupled nature of fast reactors 15 in general, particularly in regards to the fluid fuel 16 considerations of the fast spectrum system, you don't 17 have the local heterogeneous effect that you would see 18 in some of the thermal salt systems where you can get 19 variations in the power temperature coefficients that 20 can be, create power and temperature coefficients that 21 can be pretty variable.
22 So that at least helps and simplify the 23 approach you have here, but nonetheless, that is a 24 phenomena that's important to keep in mind. And 25 especially as we look at the gap analysis and the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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223 1 different tools we can use to address it.
2 So, moving to the next slide, titled code 3 options. Basically, there's a variety of tools that 4 the developers and vendors are picking and choosing 5 from.
6 Now, I can't get into the specifics for 7 every developer and every vendor and what they're 8 doing so this kind of encompasses and massages out all 9 the details, but should hopefully provide enough 10 clarity to provide some good insights about where 11 people are going, just out of respect for the vendors 12 proprietary interests.
13 But, the general views are, there's 14 advanced tools. And I kind of bullet NEAMS because 15 that's really the house where these tools are being 16 developed.
17 That are, frankly some of them are being 18 used to support licensing activities today by some 19 vendors. Particularly around the fuel performance 20 side. And I think we'll see that continued giving the 21 state of maturity of those codes and their used case 22 in the licensing process.
23 But then there is also legacy tools. So, 24 as you said, might be sort of already existing tools 25 that are out there, highlighted or course by SAS4A and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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224 1 SASSY as I would say, kind of flagship severe accident 2 fast reactor code suite available today.
3 As well as some others that are being used 4 just to particular compliment where, basically build 5 off the legacy that we build in terms of different 6 codes that support the various fast reactor programs 7 that this country has undertaken.
8 However, some of those codes are sort of, 9 in some degrees, last a little bit so they need to be 10 modernized. And that's an effort that the labs are 11 doing, and also industry is picking up as well.
12 But nonetheless, I think what the common 13 approach here is, is there's going to be a hybrid 14 approach in the near-term and then in the longer-term 15 I think you'll start to see that evolution of all 16 these tools converge on the more advanced capability 17 set.
18 There's also in-house codes. I highlight 19 that this is a very important item because several 20 vendors and developers are pursuing and developing 21 their in-house tools that sometimes leverage legacy 22 capabilities but also are establishing new 23 capabilities to support their specific designs and 24 need sets.
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225 1 fidelity system level codes for accident analysis to 2 fairly simply but important codes that compliment what 3 we might already have in an electronic suite, to give 4 it a better capability set for a specific design of 5 interest.
6 MEMBER CORRADINI: Can I ask a question at 7 this point?
8 MR. DEWITTE: Yes.
9 MEMBER CORRADINI: I want to make sure I'm 10 clear. So, are the advanced tools being used to 11 replace legacy, I guess when you say legacy, already 12 existing either within the DOE to allow these 13 potential vendors to use them, are they replacing the 14 same physics with a more efficient way of analyzing or 15 estimating the physical phenomena or are there gaps 16 that these advanced tools are providing?
17 I'm, in at least --
18 MR. DEWITTE: Yes.
19 MEMBER CORRADINI: -- at least my limited 20 memory of this there was a gap analysis run by the DOE 21 for liquid metal systems, primarily sodium --
22 MR. DEWITTE: Right.
23 MEMBER CORRADINI: -- and that gap 24 analysis is about five or six years old. And most of 25 it was, I don't remember a strong, a large amount of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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226 1 gaps available, so I'm trying to understand where the 2 advanced tools are being plugged in and for what 3 reason.
4 MR. DEWITTE: Yes. That's a good 5 question. And frankly, the answer is both of what you 6 asked.
7 So, in large perspective there are not 8 very many gaps on the sodium. There really aren't 9 many at all from the different design.
10 You know, each design might have a 11 specific consideration here, they may need something 12 else on, but in general, there really aren't gaps in 13 the tool set available from the existing tools today.
14 So, what the advance tools though are 15 bringing to bear, are typically the tools, basically 16 codes that are, frankly, both more useable, more 17 flexible and more capable in how they operate, how 18 they're used. So, it's kind of just a better overall 19 package to use, which is why some are using it.
20 However, they're not all, you're not 21 replacing all the legacy tools with some of these 22 codes. So, just to give a more specific example, on 23 the neutronics side, for example, PROTEUS, from the 24 deterministic side for a particular sodium core, gives 25 you some enhanced capabilities compared to, for NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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227 1 example, what you could you do with DIF3D and REBUS.
2 So you can see the case where maybe DIF3D 3 and REBUS is being used to support to good, new 4 general design work but then you move to PROTEUS to 5 support some of your licensing work. Or you use Monte 6 Carlo tools similarly to support those high-fidelity 7 analyses that you might need to do.
8 That basically just gives you a better 9 overall answer. So, it's just an improvement, 10 frankly, over some of what the existing tools are.
11 But not for all tools.
12 So there is, in many cases, existing tools 13 that don't have a current analog that's capable yet to 14 fully replace the legacy tools so that's part of the 15 element. The other challenge is though, some of these 16 legacy tools are relatively difficult to use and 17 somewhat hard to actually plug into the modern 18 engineering environment that the developers are 19 implementing.
20 So, when you think of sort of advanced 21 program interfaces and different approaches that 22 different developers are taking to automate how they 23 do their analyses and support their quality assurance 24 that they need to implement, there could be some 25 challenges with that.
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228 1 And so, there's some advantages that the 2 modern tools give you in that framework. And I think 3 Brandon mentioned that from the Kairos perspective.
4 There's a similar story there.
5 So, it's sort of just a general evolution 6 and modernization of some of these tools. So, you're 7 going to see that mixed approach which is why.
8 Now, the other answer though, that's 9 important here is, that gap analysis is true, there 10 aren't gaps in existing tools with the sodium side, 11 but when you get to the -- it becomes more gas 12 enforced, when you get to the gas side, similar story, 13 and when you get to the salt side, even more gas in 14 terms of what's existing and what can be done.
15 So, in a lot of cases, these modern tools 16 give you the flexibility to encompass the broader 17 suite of technology.
18 MEMBER CORRADINI: But --
19 MR. DEWITTE: And again, just a good 20 example of that is the work they've done on the 21 electronic side where you have tools that now have 22 higher fidelity capabilities and are flexible enough 23 to support the different considerations that play for 24 these different kind of reactor types.
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229 1 there and ask a similar question I asked of the 2 previous speakers. I'm not sure if you were 3 listening.
4 MR. DEWITTE: Yes.
5 MEMBER CORRADINI: Is that, for all of 6 these, I'm looking at some sort of boxology, forget 7 about the name of the code, on where I would have to 8 develop cross-sections, multi-group cross-sections 9 that would lead to some sort of neutronics analysis 10 which would lead to, essentially, fuel cycle 11 performance, which would lead to reactivity feedback 12 coefficients definitely necessary for the sodium for 13 a liquid metal reactor. And then I would have to do 14 transient analysis.
15 If I have that sort of makeup, I would 16 think even though you have all these various potential 17 vendors out there that you named as part of your 18 working group, there's got to be some sort of logic to 19 all of this that is cross-cutting. Has that been 20 developed as part of the working group, the liquid 21 metal working group?
22 MR. DEWITTE: I --
23 MEMBER CORRADINI: I know it existed 30 24 years when Clinch River was going up for licensing, so 25 I'm sure it exists in some fashion now.
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230 1 MR. DEWITTE: Yes.
2 MEMBER CORRADINI: Is that being used by 3 the working group?
4 MR. DEWITTE: Yes, it exists for the 5 liquid metal developers, but it doesn't exist for 6 everyone announced in the group yet.
7 MEMBER CORRADINI: Right.
8 MR. DEWITTE: I think there's a vector on 9 what we want to achieve, but yes, that does exist in 10 how that approach go.
11 And the reality though is, different tools 12 provide different capabilities. In that process you 13 just described, a lot of the developers are 14 integrating themselves, so their wrapping the codes 15 together in-house. And that's an important capability 16 at, that's where, for example, some of the usability 17 features of the modern tools basically gives you an 18 advantage if you want to use those.
19 But yes, that work flow, what you 20 described, yes, that's basically what's being 21 followed. And then being developed I would say, or at 22 least that's the target objective to be developed, to 23 support the other concepts that are out there.
24 MEMBER CORRADINI: Has --
25 MR. DEWITTE: When --
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231 1 MEMBER CORRADINI: No, that's fine, I'll 2 let you get on with your talk, but has this been 3 discussed with the staff?
4 With the NRC Staff, because, from the 5 standpoint of planning, again, I'm kind of more 6 focused on the staff and what they need to plan, that 7 would give them some idea of what is out there in 8 terms of what needs to be out there, whether it be a 9 legacy tool or a new NEAMS tool, et cetera.
10 MR. DEWITTE: Yes. I think to answer your 11 question, I don't think the industry has communicated 12 that very holistically, rather we've basically had, 13 we've relied I should say, on the messages that have 14 been communicated from DOE and the National 15 Laboratory, based on some training that was done at 16 different points in time over the last five or so 17 years.
18 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay. All right, thank 19 you.
20 MR. DEWITTE: Now, that's being 21 modernized. And each vendor, I can say for the vendor 22 frankly that has been engaging with the NRC on the 23 fast reactor side at this point, yes, we've outlined 24 with the NRC and outlined our approach on how we 25 intend to pursue this pathway --
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232 1 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay. All right.
2 MR. DEWITTE: -- given the unique 3 considerations there.
4 MEMBER CORRADINI: All right, sorry to 5 stop you. Go ahead.
6 MR. DEWITTE: No. No, the last little 7 bullet is commercial code. I bring that up, it's an 8 important piece here because there are certain 9 capabilities between the commercial, FEA specifically, 10 tool providers out there that will be used to support 11 different points of the analyses.
12 And also, I think something that's very 13 interesting that we're working with Studsvik 14 Scandpower on, we meaning kind of the group of fast 15 reactor developers is, is exploring what it would look 16 like for them to develop effectively a CASMO simulate, 17 if you will, for fast reactors. I think there would 18 be a lot of power in having that tool exist on a 19 commercial side --
20 MEMBER REMPE: Jacob, I'm having trouble 21 --
22 MR. DEWITTE: -- to give us --
23 MEMBER REMPE: Jacob? I'm having trouble 24 --
25 MR. DEWITTE: Yes.
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233 1 MEMBER REMPE: -- understanding you, could 2 you back up a couple of sentences and talk a bit 3 slower? There's just a very fuzzy voice coming 4 through, okay?
5 MR. DEWITTE: Yes, sorry. Again, having 6 to deal with a cold and the wildfire smoke it kind of 7 throttles the voice.
8 Yes, Joy, what I was saying was, we're 9 also excited because we're exploring some options with 10 Studsvik Scandpower to implement, to basically work 11 with them to develop what would have looked like 12 effectively a CASMO simulate type tool set for fast 13 reactor core design and core analysis.
14 We can do good licensing analyses with the 15 tools that are available, but we think there is some 16 ways to be more efficient and more capable, but also 17 help on the utility side to sort of, when you think 18 about what future deployment looks like. If you have 19 utilities who are running and operating some of these 20 plants, being able to use tools that they're pretty 21 familiar with but now can actually work in the fast 22 reactor environment is a pretty helpful bridge.
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234 1 with NQA-1 behind it versus commercial grade 2 dedication that would go on with DOE tools or other 3 tools that might be used.
4 So, does that kind of, could you 5 understand me on that?
6 MEMBER REMPE: Okay. The fast reactor 7 group is doing this, is what you're saying?
8 MR. DEWITTE: Yes.
9 MEMBER REMPE: Okay.
10 MR. DEWITTE: Yes. We're exploring that 11 now with Studsvik Scandpower.
12 MEMBER CORRADINI: Keep on going, you're 13 doing great.
14 MR. DEWITTE: The next slide, Slide 6, is, 15 in terms of different analysis areas I just highlight 16 those just to give you a preview of what I'm going to 17 jump to. So, jumping to the next slide, which would 18 be Slide 7, reactor physics.
19 I'm going to breeze through these for the 20 sake of time. I know you've seen some of these 21 before, but please interrupt me if you have any 22 questions.
23 In general, I bucket these into three 24 topics here. There's a cross-section generation 25 aspect, which presents a unique consideration in the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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235 1 fast spectrum. And then tying, so there's a couple 2 tools available for that and how they're going to be 3 used to tie over to the deterministic option.
4 There's a number of options I present to 5 cover different specific areas. In general, I list 6 PROTEUS and Rattlesnake in percent kind of at the top, 7 given that those are sort of the driving codes in 8 general. And the others do support work, but they 9 also provide alternative options.
10 And then I have the Monte Carlo bucket at 11 the bottom left because some of the capabilities with 12 modern Monte Carlo tools are providing some 13 interesting ways to provide much more, well, a much 14 higher fidelity approaches to calculating some of the 15 core parameters that support the safety analysis. Or 16 at least provide a verification, I'm sorry, validation 17 or benchmark check to that.
18 MEMBER CORRADINI: So, just with Slide 7, 19 there's a lot of names up there.
20 MR. DEWITTE: A ton.
21 MEMBER CORRADINI: So, are you telling me 22 that, and pardon my simplicity, are you telling me 23 from a deterministic route I can choose anyone of 24 these to get the job done whether it's --
25 MR. DEWITTE: It depends on your design.
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236 1 MEMBER CORRADINI: I'm sorry?
2 MR. DEWITTE: It depends on your design.
3 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay, fine. Fine.
4 MR. DEWITTE: And your philosophy. So I 5 would say that each designer has their own preference 6 of these --
7 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay.
8 MR. DEWITTE: -- that's why I list them.
9 MEMBER CORRADINI: Thank you.
10 MR. DEWITTE: Yes. Going to the next 11 slide, Slide 8, thermal hydraulics. Basically a 12 similar approach here where you've got a couple of 13 different code packages where designers, based on 14 their design and their preference, might be picking.
15 You see that in this space you've got sub-16 channel. There is the SE2, the SUPERENERGY2 code set.
17 Kind of dedicates the legacy tools, but what we're 18 seeing with SAM and PRONGHORN coming forward, could be 19 fairly useful in terms of complimenting or maybe 20 replacing that from the advanced tool side.
21 And then on the systems side you got SAM 22 emerging as an advanced tool that has pretty high 23 capabilities, but the sort of workhorse has been SAS4A 24 and SASSYS. But there are some limitations of how 25 easy that can be to integrate.
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237 1 And I should highlight that, and again, 2 I'm just picking for the sake for of time, I'll 3 highlight on the system code level at the bottom.
4 Some of the developers are also looking at FLOWNEX, 5 which has some carryover with the gas reactor 6 community, given its capabilities for single-phase 7 flows from the system side analysis.
8 And then there is also, on the right-hand 9 side, CFD. And I just bracket FEA because in some 10 cases, these are being used to do more thermal 11 mechanical solving.
12 But you've got the package of both NEK, 13 NEK5000 to the various commercial codes that different 14 developers are working with to do some of the high-15 fidelity analyses they need to support some of those 16 localized phenomena or specific phenomena of detailed 17 interests. Thermal stratification being an example in 18 the liquid metal cooled system.
19 Moving to Slide 9. This kind of buckets 20 a bunch of stuff up there, but in terms of fuel 21 performance, Bison is emerging as the leading 22 contender for, I would say advance fuel performance 23 modeling and simulation.
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238 1 explore more in-depth. But, in general, Bison is a 2 pretty robust tool that I think its capabilities were 3 probably, just frankly, maybe a little bit sort of 4 under presented in terms of the metallic fuel space, 5 given what they can do.
6 There are some gaps there of course that 7 they're working on filling, but we've been very 8 impressed with the capabilities they've demonstrated.
9 LIFE-METAL is sort of the existing tool 10 that, I think what we're seeing vendors do is use both 11 like metal inherent geometry limitations for what it 12 could do, but it works very well for the more 13 traditional space for like legacy design PIN spec 14 specifications. So, thinking about what an EBR2 to a 15 said PRISM or even back to an FFTF or a center type 16 approach.
17 Like metals can give you a good example.
18 Or works pretty well in that kind of configuration.
19 But there are some limitations that Bison can help 20 overcome.
21 So we're seeing those two sort of work 22 together and some designers are pursuing Bison in 23 preference just because of the capabilities.
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239 1 performance in SAS4A. Specifically meaning there are 2 transient fuel performance and fuel failure models.
3 Very robust ones in SAS4A and SASSYS that are sort of, 4 I think, being adopted in different forms and 5 different flavors.
6 Meaning, either if they're not using 7 SAS4A/SASSYS fully, they may be just using the fuel 8 performance, in some cases, to do, to capture those 9 analyses.
10 Structural/mechanical, similar story as I 11 mentioned on the FEA side. Both bringing in a legacy 12 tool, is NUBOW, or NUBOW, sorry, 3D, which is 13 basically rod bowing.
14 And then Diablo, which is a high-fidelity 15 structural mechanics code. And that Argonne has done 16 quite a bit of work coupling with their various tools.
17 From the risk analysis side, I'll 18 highlight this because I think it's important. We've 19 seen fast reactor developers now implementing this.
20 Basically, ADAPT provides a dynamic 21 probabilistic risk analysis platform that we see a lot 22 of, what we see increasing interest and value in.
23 Sandia and Argonne work together to actually couple 24 that with a SAS4A/SASSYS.
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240 1 coupling capability to actually do your source term 2 calculations when you combine with your risk analysis.
3 So I think that's going to be growing in use so I 4 wanted to highlight it.
5 And then the source term side there's sort 6 of the legacy tools, SAS4A/SASSYS, CONTAIN-LMR, which 7 basically somewhat has been folded into MELCOR.
8 There's a longer discussion there so for the sake of 9 time we won't get into, but there are capabilities 10 from that that are useful, but nonetheless, we think 11 between SAS4A/SASSYS and then MELCOR and sort of the 12 present codes to MELCOR like MACCS or RASCAL, are what 13 give you basically the transport to the site boundary 14 and dose analysis you need to do.
15 So we feel pretty confident in what those 16 capabilities look like. With the idea that 17 potentially SAM and other codes could develop in, and 18 sort of combine with those or maybe replace those 19 tools.
20 MEMBER REMPE: Tell me again a bit more 21 about ADAPT. This is a new Argonne, Sandia effort?
22 MR. DEWITTE: This is --
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241 1 from DOE, is that what this has come from or what is 2 this?
3 MR. DEWITTE: It's actually not. This is 4 actually a Sandia tool. It's a dynamic PRA simulator.
5 So it's basically a dynamic --
6 MEMBER REMPE: Okay.
7 MR. DEWITTE: -- thriving tool. But you 8 can then couple with an accident code such as 9 SAS4A/SASSYS. Which is what Sandia worked with 10 Argonne to do, to create sort of an all in one tool 11 that you can propagate through your accident space and 12 your event sequences without having to sort of 13 structure yourself into those sequences, given the 14 sort of inherent biases that come with building out 15 your sort of event tree.
16 Basically, what it is a more robust way of 17 doing a holistic probabilistic risk assessment on a 18 plant. So, effectively, it just drives a bunch of 19 SAS4A simulations at the different states, from the 20 different states, and through the different states the 21 plant will evolve to in a transient.
22 And that does so in a pretty powerful way 23 that allows you to capture some interesting insights 24 about what might you be missing in terms of your event 25 tree analyses. So, it's interesting from a design NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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242 1 side and it also has the power on the licensing side 2 as well.
3 MEMBER REMPE: Does it require a --
4 MEMBER BLEY: Is --
5 MEMBER REMPE: detailed design? Like, do 6 you have to -- oh, Dennis, did you have a question?
7 MEMBER BLEY: Yes, I did. Following up on 8 your last one, because I haven't heard of ADAPT 9 before. I don't think we've talked about it at the 10 DOE meeting, the last one.
11 Does this fall under the work of --
12 Schmidt's over in Belgium 15 or 20 years ago? It 13 sounds very similar.
14 MR. DEWITTE: You know, I don't know. I 15 can look at that and get you an answer. I'm not 16 familiar with that past work but I know --
17 MEMBER BLEY: I'd be interested because 18 they really ran into problems with overload on the 19 computers --
20 MR. DEWITTE: Yes. That's actually the 21 interesting angle. So, it might be related because of 22 that.
23 Because the, that's the cool thing is the 24 advance of the computers today give us the 25 capabilities to do this stuff now actually. Think NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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243 1 about how computers have advanced in the last 15, 20 2 years, we're really not nearly as challenged.
3 And, Joy, to get to your question about 4 how much detail you need, yes, that is an important 5 aspect here, but it could be very useful in the design 6 side of informing what actually really matters to the 7 plant and then where you need to add the appropriate 8 detail, so then support getting into these analyses 9 sort of in a, through the design. Like, in a coupled 10 way between the design process and the actual 11 development process.
12 MEMBER CORRADINI: We have somebody in the 13 room that I think can help Dennis a bit too.
14 MR. DEWITTE: Okay.
15 MR. GAUNTT: This is Randy Gauntt, Sandia 16 Labs.
17 MR. DEWITTE: Oh, hey, Randy.
18 MR. GAUNTT: Yes. So, the ADAPT code is 19 a dynamic event tree scheduler. And it's kind of co-20 diagnostics. You can drive pretty much any code with 21 the ADAPT driver.
22 It's a joint effort between Sandia Labs 23 and Ohio State University. And what it does is it 24 walks your way through an event tree kind of a 25 construct, making temporal, conditional decisions to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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244 1 spawn off two offshoots, at this point. And it kind 2 of produces an event tree like collection of analyses 3 that you can then come back and sort through.
4 MEMBER REMPE: So, I'm curious. So, let's 5 explore this for a minute. So, the person has a 6 design or they have to have an event tree as input to 7 use ADAPT?
8 MR. GAUNTT: It's, like I say, it's kind 9 of agnostic. You can hook this up to MELCOR, which 10 we've done, you can hook this up to SAS4A.
11 The specifics of the design, I guess, 12 would come back to the designs, the event tree 13 decision points, say, if a pump works or a pump 14 doesn't work or --
15 MEMBER REMPE: So, basically you define a 16 transient, assuming the pump does or doesn't work, it 17 does the analysis and then the analyst says, oh, it's 18 better to have an extra pump here, something like 19 that, so it feeds back to helping you design.
20 MR. GAUNTT: Yes, that might be a little 21 simplified, but it just sort of accommodates things 22 like operator decisions, timeliness of decisions. So 23 it's got a definite temporal component to when this 24 event tree branches off into one or more branches.
25 And then those branches can branch --
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245 1 MEMBER REMPE: Okay.
2 MR. GAUNTT: -- as you proceed through.
3 MEMBER REMPE: Thank you.
4 MEMBER CORRADINI: Dennis, does that help 5 you?
6 MEMBER BLEY: It helped some. I'd be real 7 interested in learning more about it.
8 MEMBER CORRADINI: Well, we'll take it --
9 MEMBER BLEY: Like I said, it's sounds 10 like he'd be able to --
11 MEMBER CORRADINI: I'll make sure I 12 capture Dr. Gauntt to get you a reference, okay?
13 MEMBER BLEY: Thank you.
14 MEMBER REMPE: Yes, in fact, several of us 15 will be curious about it.
16 MEMBER CORRADINI: Yes. Yes, we'll get it 17 for the Committee. So, Jacob, you have about three 18 minutes.
19 MR. DEWITTE: Great. Well, thanks. Yes, 20 thanks, Randy, for adding to that.
21 So, as you mentioned, there is some unique 22 capabilities that that provides that I think are 23 pretty powerful, especially given the fact that 24 there's already been integration work with some of the 25 tools that I mentioned before. So it gives you some NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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246 1 pretty, I think it's going to give kind of a glimpse 2 of where future design efforts go down that road of 3 adopting that pretty early in the process.
4 So, moving on to the next slide, Slide 10.
5 The validation. Basically, validation bases do exist 6 to varying degrees for different designs that are out 7 there.
8 I highlight varying degrees just because 9 when you think of a sodium system, there is a very 10 robust of data out there. Highlighted largely by EBR-11 II and the associated liquid metal development 12 programs this country has undertaken.
13 And then there is some validation 14 available but it's a little more limited for lead 15 systems, for gas systems and for salt systems. So 16 there is a lot of interesting work going on in terms 17 of trying to expand the data available for that.
18 But the important part, I'll just spend a 19 little more time to dive into here is, on the sodium 20 side you've got a pretty rigorous case of fuel 21 performance that's come from in pile, out of pile, as 22 well as in tree. So, transient testing on metal fuel 23 as well as off side fuel.
24 There's also been a vast spectrum of 25 radiation done on carbides and nitrides, that there is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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247 1 some legacy data available on. And an important 2 effort that we've been very appreciative of, from DOE, 3 for working through with the labs on developing, and 4 we urge them to sort accelerate this is, is archiving 5 a lot of that data into sort of useable and searchable 6 databases that can then support how that data is going 7 to be used on the validation side.
8 So that's been an important ongoing effort 9 and feeling that we continue to emphasize is one of 10 the most important things they could do, because 11 recreating this data just can't be done practically.
12 So, that's helpful.
13 There is a lot of component data that's 14 held in different plant databases that's been compiled 15 under the NaSCoRD database, which has been very 16 valuable. And that's a growing effort that I think is 17 going to provide a lot of value for the designers.
18 And then there is, of course, the broad 19 overall reactor operational data that has come from a 20 number of different reactors in the lessons learned.
21 They're go not just into design but different actual 22 tests that were run, of course highlighted by the EBR-23 II shutdown heat removal that are going to be very 24 valuable in terms of providing data and validation.
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248 1 for me. The next slide, Slide 11, is just a general 2 summary that basically kind of captures what I said.
3 And for the sake of time, I'll just jump and see if 4 there's any other questions left before I run out of 5 time.
6 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay, thank you, Jacob.
7 Questions from the Committee?
8 MEMBER REMPE: So, I have one. I missed 9 the very first part of your presentation because I was 10 otherwise doing something else, but on Slide 2 you do 11 list all these different members of your working 12 group.
13 MR. DEWITTE: Yes.
14 MEMBER REMPE: And there's a diversity in 15 the maturity of the designs that they're pursuing, and 16 I, at least for the ones that are design developers of 17 this working group. And I have been involved in other 18 conversations regarding the licensee modernization 19 project, which, by the way, I don't know if you're 20 aware of it, but --
21 MR. DEWITTE: Yes.
22 MEMBER REMPE: -- it's just an option 23 that's available to these different types of designs 24 with different maturities.
25 MR. DEWITTE: Yes.
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249 1 MEMBER REMPE: And I was puzzled to hear 2 that some folks that are less matured designs are 3 saying that it's hindering their efforts to move 4 forward with getting their design license. And, do 5 you have any insights you can give me on that and what 6 is the problem, because, again, this is a little off 7 topic but it's of interest to the ACRS?
8 MR. DEWITTE: Yes. I think that that 9 question, yes, so, there are some insights I have on 10 that.
11 I mean, in general, I think the broad 12 consensus of the group is there's a lot of value in 13 that work and where it goes in terms of what it's also 14 doing as an option. I think there has been some, as 15 the process has been matured, LMP has been matured and 16 sort of evolved to the point of being, to some degree 17 demonstrated and piloted.
18 There have been some concerns about how 19 they approach certain aspects of the review, so, for 20 example, I know the considerations around defense in-21 depth requirements that apply when there is really no 22 source term or even any consequence of an event, does 23 that make sense to evaluate some of the defense in-24 depth side if you're getting rid of all the 25 consequence from that side throughout other means.
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250 1 So, there's concerns about how that's 2 approached. And I think the LMP group has actually, 3 they've been taking steps to try to figure out how to 4 approach that.
5 I think otherwise, I think there is some 6 curiosity in about what this will ultimately mean in 7 the design space for different vendors. I think there 8 is just, people are learning and understanding how 9 they can use this and what that looks like and what 10 that would impact, how that would impact their design.
11 I haven't specifically heard really 12 someone specifically say that it, itself, hinders 13 their licensing strategy outside of some of the 14 caveats I mentioned saying, hey, this seems to be 15 interesting and could be probably very useful but seem 16 to be, so maybe little bits of things, little gaps 17 that we should fill in or better think about how we 18 approach.
19 MEMBER REMPE: So --
20 MR. DEWITTE: So, you know, it's hard --
21 MEMBER REMPE: So, let me paraphrase what 22 I think I'm hearing from you because, again, I'm 23 having trouble with the fuzziness. But basically 24 you're saying that, everyone does recognize it is just 25 an option and the concerns are limited.
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251 1 There is just certain aspects that haven't 2 been fully flushed out. That no one thinks it's 3 really hindering their ability to license their 4 designs.
5 MR. DEWITTE: Yes. I haven't gotten the 6 sense, explicitly from someone, that it's hindering 7 their ability to license their designs.
8 MEMBER REMPE: Okay.
9 MR. DEWITTE: But, I don't know what 10 everyone's thinking on that either. But that's at 11 least the perspective that we've had when it's been 12 discussed.
13 MEMBER REMPE: Okay, thank you.
14 MEMBER CORRADINI: Thank you. Other 15 questions? Okay, Jacob, thank you very much. We're 16 going to move on to NuScale. Is Andrew on line?
17 MR. LINGENFELTER: Yes. Andy Lingenfelter 18 is here.
19 MEMBER CORRADINI: Good. Thank you, Andy.
20 MR. LINGENFELTER: Okay.
21 MEMBER CORRADINI: And we have your slides 22 pulled up so feel free to begin --
23 MR. LINGENFELTER: Great.
24 MEMBER CORRADINI: -- when you're ready.
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252 1 you know I have Allyson Callaway here with me, he's a 2 supervisor for corn fuel team. And Azat Galimov, he's 3 also one of our sub-channel experts so we'll kind of 4 be sharing the presentation.
5 So, first slide, agenda is Slide 3. It's 6 what we're going to go through today sort of how we've 7 interacted with CASL in the past. And some good work 8 with NEAMS and then our suggestions on advanced ModSim 9 going forward. So, that's what we'll cover.
10 So, on to Slide Number 4. I'll let Azat 11 share what we've done with sub-channels. Go ahead, 12 Azat.
13 MR. GALIMOV: Hello. During selection 14 process of when we, in 2014, NuScale decided to select 15 a sub-channel methodology and code to go on with the 16 licensing. It was decided to just work with the 17 several codes.
18 And one of those was COBRA and the second 19 was VIPER. And the methodology and the collaboration 20 with CASL at that time was very valuable because we 21 was able to compare results and run some tests and 22 historical experiments. NuScale specific type of 23 phenomena like GE 3x3, PNNL.
24 And the CASL provides results, helped, to 25 us, establish the path for the future development of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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253 1 our NuScale sub-channel methodology. Okay, next 2 slide.
3 MR. LINGENFELTER: Okay.
4 MS. CALLAWAY: Okay. This is Allyson 5 Callaway, I'm just speaking to Slide 5 quickly.
6 So, since some of the historical work that 7 we've done with CASL in the past over the last few 8 years --
9 MEMBER CORRADINI: I'm sorry, I don't mean 10 to interrupt but you guys are hard to hear, so you're 11 going to have to either speak slower and a little more 12 clearly. What slide are you on?
13 MS. CALLAWAY: Slide 5.
14 MEMBER CORRADINI: Slide 5. Okay, thank 15 you.
16 MS. CALLAWAY: So, since the last few 17 years of historical work that we've done with CASL, 18 and more recently in 2018 and at the end of 2017, we 19 were engaged with CASL, mostly on looking at CRUD 20 analysis. And I think that's going to come up later.
21 But CRUD analysis is a big thing that we 22 were continued to be engaged with them on. And just 23 the overall interests for the possibilities for the 24 VERA tool at NuScale kept a lot of interests among our 25 technical staff.
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254 1 And so, in June of this year we had 2 training. And we had somebody from CASL come out and 3 conduct a two day training with our team.
4 And this is a really valuable step for 5 NuScale because we got familiarity with the code, 6 which is a lot more than just being able to get access 7 to the code and use it. Familiarity with using it for 8 NuScale applications and it got a lot of attention for 9 the way that we should, could be able to apply the 10 code in the future for NuScale. For a lot of future 11 development that we can do and would get the leverage 12 of this tool for hopefully.
13 So, the training was given to our systems 14 and core thermal hydraulics team as well as to our 15 code development team. So then a lot of exposure on 16 the engineers that are going to be applying the code 17 as well as engineers that would be doing code 18 development and validation.
19 So, since then over the last four or five 20 or six months, we've done a lot of thinking about the 21 way that we'd like to continue to use the code and the 22 way that we want to see the code continue to be 23 developed for use.
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255 1 of applications for NuScale, are further CRUD 2 analyses. We're interested in looking at Guide 2 3 boiling analysis, flow distribution and boron mixing, 4 alternate sub-channel methods, so perhaps using COBRA-5 TF. And then being able to use the code for 6 validating other methods.
7 So, it was kind of a big jumping off point 8 and we're hoping that we get to start taking it a lot 9 further and a lot more ways going forward.
10 MEMBER CORRADINI: So, may I characterize 11 what you just said in shorthand?
12 MS. CALLAWAY: Sure.
13 MEMBER CORRADINI: So, you're using this 14 as backup analyses for potential future use?
15 MS. CALLAWAY: Yes.
16 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay.
17 MS. CALLAWAY: That's fair.
18 MEMBER CORRADINI: Thank you.
19 MS. CALLAWAY: So, if there is no other 20 questions on that we'll move on to the next slide.
21 MR. GALIMOV: This is Azat Galimov again.
22 I want to talk about assessments of the CRUD build-up.
23 It was to perform a preliminary CRUD 24 analysis to forecast the CRUD induced phenomena. I 25 mean, to forecast operational CRUD behavior.
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256 1 And the test stand activities included the 2 development of the VERA model for the NuScale SMR.
3 And then code-to-code comparisons and coupled 4 neutronics and thermal-hydraulic simulations of eight 5 fuel cycles to achieve equilibrium operating 6 conditions for the CRUD analysis.
7 At the same time, it was the, VERA was 8 compared against our in-house predictions for the 9 neutronics and thermal hydraulic tools. And we tried 10 to just compare what was the predictions again, 11 thermal hydraulic predictions at the same time. We 12 wanted to see what the specifics of the CRUD and the 13 heat and the fuel phenomena is specific for our plant.
14 So, VERA demonstrated excellent 15 capabilities to model that that NuScale core and 16 consistency with the results from the multiple 17 industry standard codes. And showed that some 18 differences in the CRUD buildup in the core, because 19 it was due to a different specific thermal hydraulic 20 condition.
21 Next slide please. And then the future 22 projects, what we actually are wanting to do in 2019 23 is a continued collaboration of the developments of 24 the CRUD assessment methodology.
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257 1 and review the results and find the path to future 2 development of the CRUD assessment and methodology.
3 And the second path is, used a combination 4 of computational fluid dynamics. And VERA core 5 simulator too for multidimensional assessment of the 6 reactor core flow, Guide 2 boiling, boron 7 distribution.
8 And this is going to be very helpful 9 because it's going to, as we already said, it's going 10 to be part of the backup analysis. And maybe it's 11 going to be a future methodology, sub-channel and 12 system flow methodology.
13 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Can I ask a question 14 here? Hello?
15 MR. GALIMOV: Excuse me?
16 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Yes. Okay, on the 17 boron distribution, are you going to, are you planning 18 to model the boron distribution in the vessel or 19 you're also going to include the mixing of the boron 20 you injected?
21 MR. GALIMOV: We will do a boron 22 distribution in the vessel first.
23 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Okay.
24 MR. GALIMOV: So, the planning is the 25 preliminary and we actually want to do actually the, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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258 1 one of the transients in that. And maybe even the 2 long-term cooling. However, all this just under 3 planning.
4 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Yes. Okay, so this 5 effort with VERA is not going to include the boron 6 mixing as you inject it?
7 MR. GALIMOV: Not yet.
8 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Okay. But, okay.
9 We'll talk about that when we have a NuScale specific 10 meeting.
11 (Laughter.)
12 MEMBER CORRADINI: Keep on going.
13 MR. LINGENFELTER: Okay. The next topic 14 is around NEAMS in particular. Many of you know we 15 have a helical steam generator in the design.
16 And so, what was particularly helpful is 17 -- NEAMS with the SHARP code. And since we didn't, it 18 was limited research that was available on helical 19 tube steam generators --
20 MEMBER CORRADINI: Can you speak a little 21 bit, if this is Andrew --
22 MR. LINGENFELTER: Yes.
23 MEMBER CORRADINI: -- Andrew, can you 24 speak a little bit louder please?
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259 1 that, is that better?
2 MEMBER CORRADINI: Yes.
3 MR. LINGENFELTER: Okay, great. So the 4 second bullet, what was a big help for the NuScale 5 team was the experiments the folks did with NEAMS to 6 help us with our helical test section predictions.
7 And obviously the SHARP analysis.
8 So, that continues today. It was 9 something that was done in the past and we're anxious 10 to see it continue, the collaboration continue into 11 the future.
12 So, maybe it wasn't specific to CASL but 13 we wanted to mention that as part of the presentation.
14 Okay.
15 And then I think when we look at Slide 9, 16 which is the final slide that we have, about future 17 recommendations, I think that what we would suggest is 18 that there's got to be some industry benefits from, I 19 don't know if it's an EPRI Department of Energy 20 sponsored SER campaign with the NRC and the ACRS, 21 around some section of VERA that would be, again, 22 something that is industry, would benefit to the 23 industry.
24 So, we put VERA-CS, which as we know, is 25 a very large scope. But, maybe there's something we NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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260 1 could all come to conclusion on that we could get it 2 licensed with the NRC then we can all benefit from 3 being able to use it as a benchmark.
4 MEMBER CORRADINI: So --
5 MR. LINGENFELTER: So, that was the one 6 thing we wanted to take, one suggestion we had going 7 forward. And Azat had two other ones at the bottom he 8 just wanted to mention also.
9 MR. GALIMOV: Yes. A part of this --
10 effort, it could be beneficial for the developers to 11 improve the codes by implementation of the generic and 12 industry-specific proprietary modules.
13 For example, dynamically linked libraries 14 for CHF and other modeling choices may actually be 15 helpfully because that's, in that situation we can 16 both, all include the basic installation and then 17 develop our in-house too for CHF or, or CHF for 18 whatever is applicable for the particular industry 19 lender.
20 And that will significantly improve the 21 usability of the software product. And also, there 22 was also a discussion on the last industry and science 23 council meeting at CASL.
24 Kind of a known, offered the idea of 25 making the user group voting function, via using the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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261 1 user group. So basically, it's going to be like a 2 feedback option from the industry to CASL and NEAMS.
3 And we can then choose what we vote. But 4 that's, maybe it's too early for now. It needs some 5 additional intermediate steps. However, it will be 6 useful in the future.
7 And we use, it's not the first time 8 introduction of this user group and the voting 9 function. If, for example, is NuScale is actively 10 participating in the VIPER user group and it's 11 actually helping us to specialize the function to be 12 implemented and set the priorities. So thank you.
13 MEMBER CORRADINI: Thank you. Let me, the 14 last slide I was listening to as you went through it, 15 I would characterize it that this slide is directed 16 more towards DOE than to the NRC. So I'm going to 17 take it under advisement but pass it on to DOE.
18 MR. LINGENFELTER: I mean, I think that, 19 I think as I understood the mission of the HRS was in 20 this, I heard, I thought, was that you folks were 21 given the task of evaluating Department of Energy 22 codes --
23 MEMBER CORRADINI: No.
24 MR. LINGENFELTER: -- to see how they 25 would, is that right?
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262 1 MEMBER CORRADINI: We were interested in 2 your needs relative to safety analysis for licensing 3 and what codes you, tools you're using. So I think 4 all that you had given us before that was helpful for, 5 at least for me, to understand where you think you 6 could use it in the process.
7 Here these strike me as process steps that 8 might be better served by providing to DOE how to 9 improve the interaction with the industry. That's my 10 interpretation.
11 MR. LINGENFELTER: Well, the other thought 12 would be is that the, you know, I think it could be 13 beneficial for the NRC, and the industry, if we had 14 some generic topical reports on some very good codes 15 and the inner agencies working together to benefit the 16 industry.
17 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay. All right, I 18 think I see that point.
19 MR. LINGENFELTER: Thank you.
20 MEMBER REMPE: Well, there's another 21 aspect that if the Commission is looking for whether 22 they should consider these DOE codes, if DOE were to 23 come in and submit a topical report for their 24 approval, that might give the Commission more 25 certainty before they stepped into them.
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263 1 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay, I'll let DOE take 2 that under advisement. All right, thank you, Andrew 3 and your other team members.
4 MR. LINGENFELTER: Thank you.
5 MEMBER CORRADINI: You can stay on the 6 line. We're going to go now to public comments.
7 So, I was informed that some members of 8 the audience wanted to make public comments. So the 9 first question is, who in the room would like to make 10 a comment relative to our topic at hand today? Come 11 to the mic.
12 Whose ever out in the telephone world, can 13 you put your phone on mute, your blinker is blinking?
14 Thank you.
15 (Laughter.)
16 MR. BOLIN: So, my name is John Bolin, I'm 17 from General Atomics. And I'm the manager for nuclear 18 reactor design within the nuclear technologies and 19 materials division of the energy group.
20 And General Atomics has a long history of 21 development of advanced reactors. Starting with the 22 Peach Bottom and Fort St. Vrain. Even before they 23 were considered advance reactors.
24 With the post TMI focus on advanced 25 reactors, GA sort of redesigned their effort toward a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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264 1 smaller reactor. The modular high temperature gas 2 cooled reactor.
3 And over the years that's evolved into 4 various other concepts. The new production reactor, 5 the gas turbine modular healing reactor and the, we 6 were one of the vendors associated with the next 7 generation nuclear plant.
8 In 2009, we looked at the market and sort 9 of made an evolution to our design where we started 10 developing a gas cooled fast reactor. Which is called 11 the Energy Multiplier Module.
12 And in that, we also worked on developing 13 a southern carbide composite cladding. And that's now 14 been, we've kind of leveraged that with the, under 15 subcontract with Westinghouse as one of the ATF 16 cladding concepts.
17 And in all this effort we have often used 18 and relied on both DOE and NRC codes, what we refer to 19 National Lab developed codes. Such as RELAP in the 20 past, DIF-3D, NCMP, MELCOR, MACCS. And more recently 21 we've been looking at FRAPCON and FRAPTRAN.
22 With the EM squared design, we're also 23 looking at, how do we get this fuel qualified. And 24 one of the efforts in that area is, we're looking at 25 ways of accelerating fuel qualification.
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265 1 So we're looking at leveraging some of the 2 efforts that CASL and NEAMS have worked on, some of 3 the codes they've worked on. Like, Shalottle and 4 Bison. And along with some micro-capsule irradiation 5 in HFIR, we plan on updating models to incorporate 6 fuel swelling and fission gas release for our UC 7 kernels.
8 And will also plan on interacting with the 9 NRC in the near future, providing them with our 10 preliminary fuel qualification plan.
11 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay, thank you. Other 12 members of the public, any other comments? I was told 13 with this big audience I was going to have a lot of 14 comments, so we planned for it. Okay.
15 And on the phone line, do we have any 16 members of the public that want to make a comment?
17 Can we take them off mute? I think you, can we take 18 them off mute?
19 OPERATOR: The conference is now in silent 20 mode.
21 MEMBER CORRADINI: No, the opposite.
22 (Laughter.)
23 OPERATOR: The conference is now in talk 24 mode.
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266 1 members of the public that want to make a comment from 2 the phone line?
3 Okay, with that, let me ask John Monninger 4 to come up and sit over there by the mic.
5 (Laughter.)
6 MEMBER CORRADINI: Don't stand, sit. So, 7 I want to make sure, I kind of want to get the 8 remaining members comments but I can of want to --
9 OPERATOR: The conference is now in silent 10 mode.
11 MEMBER CORRADINI: -- where to go from 12 here. So, do Members have their comments? Joy.
13 MEMBER REMPE: My understanding is that 14 the ATF project plan, even though the version we had 15 said draft, has been finalized and released. So when 16 you presented your presentation this morning and you 17 talked about a letter, it is for the advanced reactor 18 effort, right?
19 MR. MONNINGER: That's correct. For non-20 light water reactors, advanced reactors --
21 MEMBER REMPE: Right. The non-LWRs.
22 MR. MONNINGER: Yes.
23 MEMBER REMPE: And so, I wanted to make 24 sure that we all understand that because there was a 25 little confusion about that earlier today.
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267 1 MR. MONNINGER: So, I think where we are 2 within NRO is, there is considerable interest out 3 there in the industry and support from Congress, 4 support from DOE, et cetera. So, if the NRC is to 5 proceed in undertaking it, we want to make sure we're 6 ready and we get it right.
7 So, that's one of our desires to have the 8 letter from the ACRS and to engage you explicitly in 9 the plans and to take your feedback, recommendations, 10 comments. In addition to engage with the industry and 11 DOE et cetera.
12 If we proceed down the path, whichever 13 direction we go, it could be considerable resources 14 for the agency and we would want to use these tools 15 and products, five, ten, 15 years down the road. So 16 we want a good traceable, transparent record as to 17 where we're going.
18 So that's the big push and desire for 19 future engagement, a letter, resolve your comments, 20 questions, concerns.
21 MEMBER CORRADINI: You go ahead, Joy.
22 MEMBER REMPE: I'm good. Yes.
23 MEMBER CORRADINI: You're happy?
24 MEMBER REMPE: Yes.
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268 1 that to mean, at least going forward is, if and when 2 we have, when we have the next subcommittee, we need 3 to wait until you guys are, I'll use the word, on the 4 same page within NRO and your support from research, 5 so that we can see essentially a draft program plan of 6 what the future holds.
7 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. And we could do it 8 two different ways. I think the Office of Research, 9 who we're working very closely with, they have three 10 different reports out there they're pooling into one.
11 And various revisions to it. We've digested certain 12 aspects but not all of it.
13 A big question comes, we can interact with 14 ACRS on multiple occasions through verbal briefings or 15 we could push them out a little bit such that you 16 would have a draft document, more to digest. A lot 17 depends upon documentation.
18 You just want to hear the direction we're 19 going and provide comments or is it more of review of 20 a draft document. What happens then is we're further 21 down the road and there would tend to be potential, 22 more wetted in the path we are the further we get 23 down.
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269 1 have any comments you want to make?
2 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Not really, but if we 3 are going to write a letter, I would like to have a 4 document that documents what we are suggesting, 5 approving or recommending.
6 MEMBER REMPE: In your thought processes, 7 I get this thing with the NuScale, the comment they 8 had, a similar comment came up at our earlier meeting 9 about the DOE codes, about, is anyone coming in to 10 submit one for review. Which gives you a better feel 11 for what the codes capability is and what its 12 validation status is, et cetera.
13 Have you thought about trying to, before 14 you go too far in this, I mean, you should, I like 15 your little matrix where you're using this process to 16 prioritize, but if there is some codes that your 17 genuinely interested in and think have the most 18 promise, to work with DOE, to have some sort of 19 topical report submitted and have, or are they just 20 not far enough along even to really even have the DOE 21 submit a topical report?
22 MR. MONNINGER: From the developers?
23 MEMBER REMPE: Right.
24 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. I think it would be 25 for them to really address where they are. You know, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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270 1 at a higher level, at least to discuss their plans.
2 But in terms of whether they have anything solid to 3 submit to us yet.
4 MEMBER REMPE: But before you decide that 5 there is something of promise that you want to adopt, 6 if the department, you know, if you have a higher 7 list, I mean, they surely can't do all of them, but it 8 just seems like it might facilitate the process.
9 Frankly if someone comes in with a topical report, you 10 charge it back to them or maybe you can take it out of 11 the Congressional funding or something.
12 But, I'm just curious on, it seems like a 13 more formal engagement with DOE on the --
14 MS. CUBBAGE: This is Amy Cubbage, NRO.
15 I'm sorry.
16 MEMBER CORRADINI: You're on.
17 MS. CUBBAGE: Yes. I think you're 18 conflating a little bit what the Applicants plan to do 19 versus what we would do for independent calculations.
20 So, the individual developers, we're 21 working with a number of them in pre-application 22 status. Some of them do plan to submit topical 23 reports explaining their plans in the area of codes 24 and ultimately looking for our approval of what they 25 plan to use.
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271 1 Separately, we would be selecting what we 2 plan to use. They may be the same, they may not be 3 the same.
4 Certainly, the more we learn about the 5 designs, that helps inform what we choose to use but 6 it may or may not guide what models we plan to use.
7 If that makes sense.
8 MEMBER REMPE: So, one, you've got 9 uncertainty on which designs will come in, which 10 effects your uncertainty on which codes you want to 11 adopt.
12 MS. CUBBAGE: Right. And we do have a 13 list of developers that we're engaging with and have 14 expressed intent to engage.
15 And the extent that we have meetings with 16 them, that always informs our evaluation of the 17 potential tools out there and which ones we think have 18 the most promise for developing for independent 19 capability. But that there's an independent decision 20 from what a developer chooses to do and submit to the 21 NRC for approval.
22 And we would not be waiting for a 23 developer to come in and say, I'm going to use Code X 24 for us to make a decision because we need to be moving 25 ahead in parallel.
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272 1 MEMBER REMPE: So, then, if you are going 2 to make a decision independent of which ones come in, 3 what I was wondering is, if you could work with the 4 Department of Energy, who is the person who developed 5 this, and ask them to submit some sort of topical 6 report instead of having to jump over the line and 7 say, okay, I want to try and adopt this and get it to 8 validation status that's required for the agency.
9 MS. CUBBAGE: We are working with the 10 Department of Energy to help explain to them what our 11 needs are. And if we see areas where we think Code X, 12 Y or Z may need additional validation or something of 13 that nature.
14 But we're not looking to the Department of 15 Energy to submit codes to us for approval, because it 16 would need to be the individual developer adopting the 17 code explaining why it's appropriate for their use, 18 why it's appropriately validated for their use. So 19 the generic approval of a code like that is not 20 something we've entered in. And it looks like Jose 21 wants to jump in.
22 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: Yes. Help me with 23 this. We never licensed code for Staff use.
24 MR. MONNINGER: Right.
25 MEMBER REMPE: Right.
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273 1 MEMBER MARCH-LEUBA: The Staff can use any 2 code they choose to license without a topical.
3 MEMBER REMPE: Okay.
4 MS. CUBBAGE: Right. I think Joy was 5 implying that if developers X, Y and Z all want to use 6 a DOE code, could we approve it generically for them.
7 MEMBER REMPE: Well, I'm thinking of the 8 RELAP example, which, again, has specific applications 9 for specific folks, but it just seems like since 10 they're all depending on DOE is something could be 11 worked out. But, again, I just kind of wondered.
12 MS. CUBBAGE: Extent to which they're all 13 depending on DOE is up in the air right now.
14 MEMBER REMPE: Absolutely.
15 MS. CUBBAGE: You know, you heard from X-16 Energy here and they're not relying on a lot of the 17 NEAMS code. So, it hasn't really been broached to us 18 as a proposal from DOE nor the developers that we 19 would do any type of generic approval of a code.
20 MEMBER CORRADINI: I guess I, unless I see 21 DOE running up to the mic to say they're going to do 22 it for five developers or five owner/operators or 23 vendors --
24 MS. CUBBAGE: Right.
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274 1 going to be taken.
2 MEMBER REMPE: So then I guess I'm still 3 kind of wondering, I mean, yes, you can review these 4 things with DOE and identify gaps, there's still some 5 uncertainty until you actually were to jump over the 6 line if you decide to do that, and I'm just wondering 7 if there is ways to minimize that uncertainty because 8 you have very limited resources?
9 MS. CUBBAGE: Okay. If you're speaking 10 specifically in terms of our capability versus the 11 applicants --
12 MEMBER REMPE: Right.
13 MR. COMSTOCK: -- we're going to have to 14 be in a continual learning mode, we're going to be 15 pursuing models that we may find out new information 16 about the designs that we may need to reevaluate and 17 say, additional capability needs to be added in so 18 we're not going to be able to declare victory in the 19 near-term, this is going to be a multi-year process.
20 MEMBER CORRADINI: But if I might just use 21 an example without using names. If Company X, Y, Z 22 come in and said they'll all just thrilled to death 23 about Tool A, DOE still is not going to be the one 24 that comes in with Tool A, it's got to be up to 25 Company X, Y, Z to come in and say, this is what we're NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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275 1 going to use as part of our plan.
2 MS. CUBBAGE: That's typically in the 3 model. Although, if DOE wanted to present something 4 to our approval there's nothing that would preclude 5 that.
6 MEMBER CORRADINI: No.
7 MS. CUBBAGE: But given the competitive 8 nature of the advance reactor developer market, I 9 don't know that there would be enough companies all 10 using the same model. Because there is such variation 11 in the types of designs and variations in the business 12 models. And you heard X-Energy, for example, saying 13 we have our in-house codes X, Y, Z. So, I think it's 14 way too soon to tell if there's going to be that 15 consensus among the developers on aligning on 16 particular codes that they all want to come forward 17 with.
18 MEMBER REMPE: But let's explore the 19 thought about, why do you have to have an independent 20 code from what the developers have. And so, if you 21 want to use the same code that these developers have 22 selected, then it seems like somebody should submit 23 some sort of general document to give in or see 24 competency that they should indeed use it instead of 25 doing it on a case-by-case.
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276 1 I was just kind of wondering, maybe the 2 paradigm needs to change and there needs to be --
3 MS. CUBBAGE: We're trying to keep those 4 decision points separate because we use codes for 5 different purpose.
6 MEMBER REMPE: Absolutely.
7 MS. CUBBAGE: We're not responsible for 8 the licensing. We may not need the same fidelity, we 9 may not need the same qualification basis that an 10 individual developer may need. So, there is --
11 MEMBER REMPE: But you need some 12 confidence if you're --
13 MS. CUBBAGE: We do.
14 MEMBER REMPE: -- going to have that, say, 15 okay, yes, we're not going to have our independent 16 code, we're going to go with the same one. And so, 17 you need some sort of confidence that costs money to 18 get and staff resources.
19 And it seems like if you could push that 20 off to the person who's trying to sell you the code 21 that might be good. And then --
22 MS. CUBBAGE: To the extent that we intend 23 to use a DOE developed code, we absolutely are looking 24 for DOE to do the lifting on the qualification and the 25 model development.
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277 1 MEMBER REMPE: Which almost sounds like 2 they need to submit some sort of topical report for 3 it.
4 MS. CUBBAGE: It's a different process.
5 MEMBER CORRADINI: I think --
6 MEMBER REMPE: Yes.
7 MS. CUBBAGE: A topical report implies us 8 reviewing and approving and we don't do that for our 9 own capabilities.
10 MEMBER REMPE: Sure.
11 MEMBER SUNSERI: So I have maybe a 12 question at a broader level because I think we're 13 getting into like a specific code application.
14 MS. CUBBAGE: Yes.
15 MEMBER SUNSERI: So, on a broader level, 16 you have this project planned to prepare the U.S.
17 Regulatory for the effective licensing of accident 18 power and fuel. And Task 4 is what we're talking 19 about, I think, right? The confirmatory 20 MS. CUBBAGE: Except we're specifically 21 not talking about ATF, that's the other folks that --
22 MEMBER CORRADINI: Mirela is here so she's 23 --
24 MS. CUBBAGE: Yes, yes. Yes, Mirela is 25 here. So, there's two different answers. Mirela NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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278 1 already has a strategy in her report, and she can 2 speak to that, our strategy is under development.
3 MEMBER SUNSERI: Okay. So, that's where 4 I was going then. What is the details that supports 5 that strategy?
6 MS. CUBBAGE: Yes.
7 MEMBER SUNSERI: I think that would help 8 us if we understood --
9 MS. CUBBAGE: And that's the next meeting.
10 MEMBER SUNSERI: Okay.
11 MS. CUBBAGE: That's the next meeting.
12 MEMBER CORRADINI: I think I, just let me 13 interject. I think the open discussion is good, but 14 I'm hearing, I want to get back to, Joy asked the 15 question, Mirela wasn't in the room, but we'll come 16 back to that.
17 I think what I'm hearing is, from John and 18 Staff -- Staff, a.k.a. Amy and others in the room --
19 is there preference might be for us to wait till they 20 have a document that says, what's their path forward 21 for non-light water reactors in terms of what their 22 needs are for tools.
23 MS. CUBBAGE: Yes.
24 MEMBER CORRADINI: And then once we see 25 that, we can react to that by a meeting and then write NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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279 1 a letter report in response saying, great idea.
2 MS. CUBBAGE: And to the extent that that 3 plan relies on DOE managed developed codes, we will 4 absolutely be having closed discussions with DOE, it 5 just won't be in the form of a topical report.
6 MEMBER CORRADINI: Right.
7 MEMBER REMPE: Strong words. I think 8 we're in agreement on what needs to happen.
9 MS. CUBBAGE: We're in agreement on the 10 comments.
11 MEMBER REMPE: And I think that he did, 12 John answered the question. He said, no Mirela is 13 already, she's separate. And that was my question.
14 MEMBER CORRADINI: Well, but I want to get 15 further than that because what I'm hearing from Mirela 16 is, if I might bring you up to speed is, I don't 17 think, again, I'm speaking for myself, I don't think 18 there's a need for the ACRS to comment on your program 19 plan because you're going to go further than that with 20 interim staff guidance relative to how you're going to 21 deal with coded cladding or doped fuel. And until we 22 see that, that's probably what we would need to 23 comment on.
24 MS. GAVRILAS: That's exactly right. So, 25 what we have now is a very high-level plan for all ATF NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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280 1 concepts, near-term, long-term. And of course, it can 2 only be as specific as a high-level plant can be.
3 But, as the plan says, we are going to 4 have licensing strategies for each of the technologies 5 that's going to come in front of the Staff. For 6 example, for chromium coded, we're developing the 7 licensing strategy as we speak.
8 As we said this morning, Andrew said, 9 we're preparing the PIRT for coded cladding. We are 10 looking at our codes to see what's needed.
11 So, we're sort of, we're interacting with 12 the vendors to get the data that we need for our code 13 and understand what codes they're going to use. And 14 reviewing their qualification plan.
15 And all of that is going to come together 16 into a licensing map, which right now we're thinking 17 is going to be some sort of interim staff guidance in 18 SRP4.2 that basically says, and this is how we are 19 going to review chromium coded, or coded claddings in 20 general. And similarly, a separate ISG for, this is 21 how we're going to review.
22 MEMBER CORRADINI: But, the reason I 23 wanted you to say that is to kind of get back to the 24 question when she wasn't in the room. It's not just 25 their plan, but they're going further than that. That NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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281 1 would be the point where we would be able to look at 2 it and comment on it.
3 MS. GAVRILAS: So, if you want to review 4 the plan, we're here, just let us know. But our 5 thought was that, these are coming soon. Soon as next 6 year we're going to probably have preliminary 7 engagement with the ACRS on that.
8 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay, good. Other 9 comments? John, are you happy?
10 MR. MONNINGER: We are very happy, thank 11 you.
12 (Laughter.)
13 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay. And I don't 14 think we have any more public comments. So, unless I 15 hear more from the Members, I'm going to thank 16 everybody.
17 Let me circle back. So, the plan is, or 18 the anticipated future is that until we hear from NRO 19 as to where you're going and what the report might 20 turn out to be, we'll wait and see. And at that 21 point, that would be a good time to come back together 22 and convene and talk about it.
23 MR. MONNINGER: Yes. And for interim 24 planning purposes I would say four to six months. But 25 we'll have to keep Chris and Weidong up to speed and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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282 1 have to work closely with our Office of Research. We 2 want to make sure we're prepared and solid.
3 MEMBER CORRADINI: Okay, good. Anything 4 else from the audience? This is your last chance.
5 You are all here so quiet and polite. Okay, with 6 that, we'll adjourn. Thank you very much.
7 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went 8 off the record at 2:56 p.m.)
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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ACRS Subcommittee on Thermal-Hydraulic Phenomena
- 3. Role of Computer Codes in Regulatory Decisions
- 4. Computer Codes for Advanced Reactors John Monninger, Director Division of Safety Systems, Risk Assessment, and Advanced Reactors, NRO November 16, 2018 1
- 3. Role of Computer Codes in Regulatory Decisions 2
Wide Range of NRC Sponsored Computer Codes NRC sponsored codes have largely focused on light water reactor
- MELCOR
- FRAPCON
- MACCS
- FRAPTRAN
- RADTRAD
- PARCS
- TRACE
- HABIT
- SNAP
- GALE
- RELAP5
- Others 3
The Respective Role of Computer Codes by NRC and Applicants There is a fundamental difference in NRC initiated actions and applicant initiated actions, and the party required to demonstrate the burden of proof.
NRC Responsibility Applicant/Licensee Responsibility
- Rulemakings
- Technical/safety/compliance base for
- Regulatory analysis license applications and
- Backfit analysis amendments
- Reactor Oversight Process
- Core reload analysis, design changes, methodology
- Safety studies The technical/safety basis to support a
- Generic Issues Program licensing decision must be demonstrated by the applicant. The applicants analysis and models are part of the licensing basis and carry forward. NRC confirmatory analyses, if conducted, have a limited role in licensing applications.
4
NRC Confirmatory Analysis for License Applications
- Confirmatory analysis is not required; however, NRC may conduct limited confirmatory analysis in support of a licensing review
- Confirmatory analysis is supposed to facilitate an effective and efficient licensing review
- Examples of when and why we do confirmatory analyses
- First-of-a-kind (or unique) designs, features, or operations
- Safety margins are small
- Effective use of NRC resources to focus the review (e.g., requests for additional information, areas to audit)
- Gain insights on sensitivities and important areas of application 5
NRC Confirmatory Analysis for License Applications
- NRC confirmatory analysis may use NRC codes, DOE codes, applicant codes, or other codes
- Confirmatory analysis may be a complete re-analysis of an applicants analysis, or it could be multiple mini-sensitivity studies to guide the overall review focus
- NRC initiated analysis (other than confirmatory analysis)
- Generally use same codes developed to support confirmatory analysis
- Generally subject to formal review and comment
- Generally not used to establish licensing basis for a facility 6
NRC Confirmatory Analysis for License Applications
- NRC regulatory guidance discusses confirmatory analysis
- SRP 6.2.1.2, Subcompartment Analysis
- The reviewer may perform a confirmatory analysis of the blowdown mass and energy profiles within a subcompartmentThe purpose of the analysis is to confirm the predictions of the mass and energy release rates appearing in the safety analysis report and to verify that the analysis considered an appropriate break location and size including LBB considerations.
- SRP 15.6.5, Loss-of-Coolant Accidents Resulting from Spectrum of Postulated Piping Breaks within the Reactor Coolant Pressure Boundary
- New reactor designs may base their ECCS and reactor coolant system designs on prevention of core uncovery. Should that be the case, the reviewer should compare the applicants analysis with the staff independent analysis to determine if the predicted level of core coverage is consistent.
7
Representative LWR Areas Where Applicants Depend Upon Computational Analysis 8
Take Aways
- NRC uses of computer codes are broader than confirmatory analysis conducted for specific licensing applications
- The scope and tool used for confirmatory analysis varies
- The technical/safety basis to support a licensing decision must be demonstrated by the applicant. The applicants analysis and models are part of the licensing basis and carry forward. NRC confirmatory analyses, if conducted, have a limited role in licensing applications.
- Confirmatory analysis is supposed to facilitate an effective and efficient licensing review 9
- 4. Computer Codes for Advanced Reactors 10
NRC Advanced Reactor Program Vision and Strategy 11
Implementation Action Plans Strategy 1 Strategy 2 Strategy 3 Strategy 4 Strategy 5 Knowledge, Skills Strategy 6 Computer Codes Flexible Review Consensus Codes Policy and Key and Capability Communication
& Review Tools Processes and Standards Technical Issues Identification & ASME BPVC Siting near ONRL Molten Salt Regulatory NRC DOE Assessment of Section III densely populated Reactor Training Roadmap Workshops Available Codes Division 5 areas ANS Standards Periodic Knowledge Prototype Insurance and 20.1, 20.2 Stakeholder Management Guidance Liability 30.2, 54.1 Meetings Consequence Competency Non-LWR Design Non-LWR NRC DOE GAIN Based Security Modeling Criteria PRA Standard MOU (SECY-18-0076)
Updated HTGR Environmental EP for SMRs International and Fast Reactor Reviews and ONTs Coordination Training (SECY-18-0103)
Licensing Functional Modernization Containment Project (SECY-18-0096)
Potential First Micro-Reactors Movers 12
NRC Approach for Advanced Reactor Computer Codes
- Vision & Strategy
- Leverage the experience available from DOE, academia, international counterparts, and industry to acquire or develop non-LWR computer codes and tools in the following functional areas: Reactor Kinetics and Criticality; Fuel Performance; Thermal-Fluid Phenomena; Severe Accident Phenomena; and Materials and Component Integrity
- Implementation Action Plan 2
- The staffs goal is to leverage, to the maximum extent practical, collaboration and cooperation with the domestic and international community interested in non-LWRs with the goal of establishing a set of tools and data that are commonly understood and accepted.
- To perform these calculations, the staff will either need to develop or have access to existing analytical codes suitable for use with non-LWR applications. Currently, the staff has analysis codes that are applicable to conventional and advanced LWRs. For non-LWR reactor designs, the initial tasks for this strategy will include evaluation and down-selecting the codes for use by the staff.
13
Engagement with ACRS on Advanced Reactor Program
- Review of Advanced Reactor Vision and Strategy &
Implementation Action Plans (February & March 2017)
- Supported overall approach and indicated that priority should be placed on Strategies 3 (flexible review processes) and 5 (resolution of policy issues)
- Indicated that Strategy 2 (computer codes) should focus on identifying data and knowledge gaps, rather than model and code development
- Discussed need for prioritization and to develop physical insights about new reactor concepts 14
NRC Report on CASL & NEAMS
- 2018 Consolidated Appropriations Act directed NRC to report on potential uses of the CASL tools in licensing processes and safety reviews
- September 2018 response addressed CASL & NEAMS and considerations for advanced reactors
- NRC is working with DOE to determine how best to leverage the CASL and NEAMS programs
- Development and modification of NRC sponsored codes is an option, and DOE sponsored codes are also under consideration
- CASL and NEAMS capabilities could be adopted if they prove to be a cost-effective means of achieving the required functionality 15
Computer Codes for Advanced Reactors
- Congress provided funding to support modernizing the NRCs regulatory infrastructure for advanced reactors, including computer codes
- NRC needs to:
- (1) be prepared to support timely and effective licensing reviews
- (2) effectively manage our funds
- (3) be transparent in our rationale, recommendations, and decisions 16
Computer Codes for Advanced Reactors
- Desirable attributes of codes for NRC staff use
- Computer codes need to be agile to support a range of regulatory uses and multiple reactor designs
- Computer codes should be designed to facilitate an effective and efficient licensing review
- NRCs assessment needs to consider life cycle costs (development, maintenance, training)
- Could use existing NRC sponsored codes, DOE sponsored codes, or other codes 17
NRC Confirmatory Analysis to Support Advanced Reactor Licensing
- Confirmatory analysis for licensing advanced reactors
- Same as previous considerations (slides 5 & 6)
- Need to also consider the extent to which the advanced reactor designs meet the Commissions expectations for advanced reactors (e.g., enhanced margins of safety)
- Quick and simple to explore sensitivities
- Ideally would be exercised by the licensing office
- Needs to be timely to support the review (e.g., completed within Phase 1 to support RAI issuance, 3-6 months and could be less for micro-reactors)
- Cost of any confirmatory analysis must be in line with overall NRC review costs
- In the absence of a given perceived need for confirmatory analysis, the applicant is responsible for resolving a given issue (e.g., RAIs, operational limitations, additional analysis or testing) 18
Evaluation of Computer Codes for Advanced Reactors
- Evaluating various codes for a range of applications -
design basis, beyond design basis, severe accidents, and consequences
- Considering factors such as
- Physics: Code suite must now or with development capture the correct physics to simulate advanced reactors. Selection of codes based on results of PIRTs.
- Flexibility: Multiple reactor design concepts require flexibility within code suite. A goal has been to limit the number of new codes.
- Code V&V: Code assessment is critical, especially assessment relative to advanced reactors
- Computation Requirements: Codes must be able to run simulations on HPC platforms available to NRC
- Cost avoidance: Minimize life cycle costs through potential leveraging DOE tools 19
RES is Using the Predictive Capability Maturity Model Characterization
- Using PCMM to characterize code readiness
- Geometric Fidelity
- Physics and Model Fidelity
- Code Verification
- Solution Verification
- Code Validation
- Uncertainty Quantification
- PCCM asks, Where are we today
- 0, little to no capability
- 1,
- 2,
- 3, state of the art, with external peer review 20
Take Aways
- We will be back
- We are assessing needs and developing recommendations for advanced reactor codes
- NRC preparedness is vital and transparency is important
- We will present our recommendations to the ACRS in a subsequent meeting
- We will request an ACRS letter on those recommendations 21
BACKUP SLIDES 22
Comprehensive Reactor Analysis Bundle Under Evaluation SCALE SERPENT MAMMOTH Cross-sections Cross-sections Neutronics FLUENT CFD PRONGHORN Core T/H PARCS Nek5000 CFD Neutronics TRACE MOOSE System T/H BISON SAM System and Core T/H MELCOR Fuel Performance Containment / FP FAST MAMMOTH Fuel Performance Neutronics SERPENT NRC Code Intl Code Commercial Cross-sections DOE Code
Source Term, Consequences, and Radiological Assessment Material Processing For Applicable Designs SCALE MELCOR MACCS With Nuclide With Radionuclide RADTRAD Sensitivity/Uncertainty inventories Uncertainty Source term RASCAL Quantification Propagation Etc Storage/Transport Of Materials Safety Review siting offsite dose control room TSC Habitability exclusion area LPZ,.
Environmental Review EIS for CP, ESP or COL Environmental Report
NRC Confirmatory Analysis of Accident Tolerant Fuel (ATF)
Andrew Proffitt, NRR ACRS Thermal-Hydraulic Phenomena Subcommittee November 16, 2018
Outline
- NRC staff approach to confirmatory analysis
- Confirmatory analysis strategy for ATF
- Coordination with DOE on advanced modeling and simulation (M&S) 2
Approach to Confirmatory Analysis
- Informed by phenomena important to safety
- safety significance
- level of knowledge
- Staff evaluation can range from:
- Review of information provided
- Confirmatory calculations
- Confirmatory testing 3
Confirmatory Analysis Strategy for ATF
- To support effective and efficient ATF reviews, staff considered:
- Modifying existing NRC codes
- Use DOE/vendor/commercial codes, including advanced M&S tools
- Factors for consideration:
- Staff experience using the tool
- Development/V&V resources necessary 4
Use of NRC Codes to Model Near-term ATF Concepts
- Tailored to evaluate regulatory requirements
- Shallow learning curve
- Minor modifications required
- Need ATF specific validation 5
Development Process for Near-term ATF Calculation Capability 6
Fuel Performance
- What is it?
- FAST (Fuel Analysis under Steady-state and Transients) calculates the thermal and mechanical response of nuclear fuel as a function of burnup under steady-state, AOOs and DBA transients.
- FRAPCON + FRAPTRAN + ATF + (Significant code updates) = FAST
- Regulatory use:
- Assess SAFDLs (NUREG 0800, Chapter 4) for new fuels, assess new/updated codes &
methods, provide initial conditions to Chapter 15 analyses, assess spent fuel behavior
- Completed work:
- Developed material library with ATF materials: FeCrAl, U3Si2, SiC, Cr-coating
- Multi-layer cladding deformation model (coatings) [KAERI]
- Ongoing work:
- Updates & assessment for doped fuels, high burnup, higher enrichment D solvers for non-cylindrical fuel, allow for fuel deformation
- Coupling to TRACE and SCALE
- ATF work needed:
- Models for appropriate compositions
-
- Assessment
- 7
Thermal-Hydraulics
- What is it?
- TRACE is a thermal-hydraulics systems safety analysis code with 3D reactor kinetics
- Regulatory use:
- Analyses of LOCAs, operational transients, and other reactor accident scenarios
- Completed work:
- Initial gap analyses of TRACE capabilities against ATF fuel forms
- Ongoing work:
- Coupling with FAST and BISON fuel rod models
- Select representative plant models and accident scenarios
- ATF work needed:
- Generalize the fuel rod thermo-mechanical models
- Add ATF fuel mechanical and thermal properties to TRACE including Tmin for new cladding materials
- Develop coupling with FAST & BISON fuel rod models
- Assess new models and perform plant analysis 8
Neutronics
- What is it?
- SCALE provides the capability to conduct neutronics analyses in such areas as lattice/core physics, transport, shielding, and criticality safety. SCALE data is also used to provide necessary information for FAST, PARCS, MELCOR and MAACS.
- PARCS provides the capability to perform core simulation with thermal-hydraulic feedback
- Regulatory use:
- Support licensing evaluations under GDC requirements through NUREG-800 Chapter 4 and 15 activities, including boron dilution accidents, rod ejection calculations, MELLLA+, etc
- Support licensing evaluations under 10 CFR 50.68/70.24 criticality accidents, 10 CFR Part 71 packaging and transport, and 10 CFR Part 72 storage requirements. Activities may include burnup credit, criticality analyses, code validation against experiment reviews, etc.
- Completed work:
- Initial gap analyses of SCALE and PARCS capabilities against ATF fuel forms and review of available validation data
- Ongoing work:
- Development of detailed research plan for ATF fuel forms
- Development of lattice level (SCALE/Polaris) and core level (PARCS) sensitivity models that will quantify how the changes presented by ATF fuel forms effect core level safety parameters in PARCS (reactivity coefficients, SDM, control rod worth)
- Review of gap conductance schemes in the NRCs PARCS core simulator code
- ATF work needed:
-
- Assessment
- 9
Severe Accident/Source Term
- What is it?
- MELCOR is NRCs computer code for predicting progression of severe accidents and source term
- Regulatory use:
- Evaluate DBA accident source term to ensure designs meet radiological criteria in CFR (e.g., 10 CFR 100.11, 10 CFR 50.67, 10 CFR 50.34(a)(1)(iv), GDC 19).
- Other regulatory source terms include equipment qualification source term and post-accident shielding source term (see for example SRP Sections 3.11 and 2.12)
- Completed work:
- Initial gap analyses of MELCOR capabilities against ATF fuel forms
- Ongoing work:
- Integrate FeCrAl module into latest version, complete benchmark, and begin sensitivity studies.
- ATF work needed:
- Develop preliminary source term for a representative BWR and a PWR using FeCrAl for selected accident scenarios and compare the results to the current source term technical basis in NUREG-1465 (RG1.183), and to similar analysis for high burnup/MOX fuel.
10
Coordination with DOE on Advanced Modelling and Simulation
- NRCs ATF project plan acknowledges potential to leverage DOEs advanced M&S tools, especially for longer-term concepts
- Staff coordinating with CASL on focused ATF effort:
- Familiarity, understanding, and training
- Development of Bison models for ATF
- Uncertainty quantification
- Benchmark problems for ATF and transition cores (neutronics)
- Development and demonstration for longer-term ATF concepts
- Improved post-processing for regulatory criteria 11
Use of DOE Codes to Support Industry Implementation of Advanced Concepts Joshua L. Parker, P.E.
Framatome Inc.
Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS)
Rockville, MD 16 November 2018 Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards - J.L. Parker 1 Rockville, MD - 16 Nov. 2018 Framatome Inc. Non-Proprietary Framatome Inc. Non-Proprietary (external) © Framatome - All rights reserved
Framatome Innovation 2
Pathway to Implementation Near-Term Short-Term Mid-Term Long-Term Innovations that can Innovations reaching Innovations that need Ideas that need be brought to market market readiness >3 but <10 years of >10 years of in very short time within 2-3 years of development development (still development conceptual stage)
Learning and innovation go hand in hand. The arrogance of success is to think that what you did yesterday will be sufficient for tomorrow. William Pollard Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards - J.L. Parker 3 Rockville, MD - 16 Nov. 2018 Framatome Inc. Non-Proprietary (external) © Framatome - All rights reserved
Framatomes Future of Nuclear Fuel
>5 wt% U235
- Enrichment in LWRs beyond 5wt% U235
- Industry Effort Required Adv. C&M Lightbridge Near-Term EATF Long-Term EATF
- Metallic fuel
- Cr-Doped Pellets
- SiC-SiC Cladding
- Cr-Coated Cladding 6 7 Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards - J.L. Parker 4 Rockville, MD - 16 Nov. 2018 Framatome Inc. Non-Proprietary (external) © Framatome - All rights reserved
Product Development Cycle 5
Linear Product Cycle Development (Historical Model)
Historically product development is very linear and sequential Problem Concept Identified or Development Large product evolutions take 10+ years from Industry Need concept to 1st implementation Design &
We have a large understanding of Zirconium Modeling Cladding and UO2 fuel and product Update implementation still takes a long time. Design &
Models DOE codes could help streamline the Testing process and help get products to market earlier to benefit the safety and economics Validation of the industry of Design No
& Models Approval NRC Proceed to Market Review Yes Proceed to Licensing Design Met Requirements?
Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards - J.L. Parker 6 Rockville, MD - 16 Nov. 2018 Framatome Inc. Non-Proprietary (external) © Framatome - All rights reserved
Linear Product Cycle Development (Improved)
Use parallelization where it makes sense to reduce the development cycle Leverage advancements in modeling and simulation to accelerate a parallelized product development DOE and Industry partnerships could help advance modeling and simulation capabilities resulting in earlier product implementation benefiting safety and reliability of the Nuclear Industry.
Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards - J.L. Parker 7 Rockville, MD - 16 Nov. 2018 Framatome Inc. Non-Proprietary (external) © Framatome - All rights reserved
Where can DOE help?
8
DOE Help Near/Short-Term Mid-Term Long-Term Cr-Doped Adv. Reactors Cr-Coated
- Si-C Cladding
- Single Code Suite for Nothing Needed
- Modeling and Behavior of Adv. Reactor Design material (Fuel rod analysis
- Industrial codes)
- Easy to use
- Metallic Fuel in LWRs
- Robust QA
- Benchmarks
- Benchmarked
- Code-to-code on DOE data comparisons with like
- Codes to aid reactors design
- >5wt%
- Benchmarks
- Codes validated up to 20wt%
Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards - J.L. Parker 9 Rockville, MD - 16 Nov. 2018 Framatome Inc. Non-Proprietary (external) © Framatome - All rights reserved
Places DOE Can Help Industry ATF (SiC-SiC)
DOE can provide independent Fuel Performance Codes Metallic Fuel in LWRs DOE can provide an independent Code Suite (Core Neutronics, Thermal-Hydraulics, Fuel Rod Performance DOE could provide a new analytical code-to-code benchmarking suite for LWRs on metallic fuel similar to the OECD/NEA benchmarks for UO2 fuel.
Advanced Reactor Fuel/Core Design DOE to consolidate or identify key codes and work with industry to develop a single industrial code suite for Adv. Reactor Development in the area of fuel and core performance that could be used for the Conceptual, Design and Licensing phase of these reactors Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards - J.L. Parker 10 Rockville, MD - 16 Nov. 2018 Framatome Inc. Non-Proprietary (external) © Framatome - All rights reserved
Conclusion Framatome will determine each business case in regards to the use of DOE codes and where best to apply them to future technologies.
More advanced products and technologies need capabilities beyond the industry. DOE needs to continue to engage industry to advance these products through design, testing and licensing to provide safety and economic benefits to the US Nuclear Fleet, today and in the future.
11
Any reproduction, alteration, transmission to any third party or publication in whole or in part of this document and/or its content is prohibited unless Framatome has provided its prior and written consent.
This document and any information it contains shall not be used for any other purpose than the one for which they were provided. Legal action may be taken against any infringer and/or any person breaching the aforementioned obligations Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards - J.L. Parker 12 Rockville, MD - 16 Nov. 2018 Framatome Inc. Non-Proprietary (external) © Framatome - All rights reserved
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Westinghouse Plans for Using CASL/NEAMS Tools Zeses Karoutas, Chief Engineer in Nuclear Fuel ACRS Meeting in DC, November 16, 2018 1
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Outline
- Westinghouse EnCore1 Fuel
- Physical Benefits of EnCore Fuel
- Safety and Economic Benefits
- Summary of Data Needed for Validation
- CASL / NEAMS Tools to be Used
- BISON ATF Applications
- VERA Core Applications for ATF
- VERA Applications for RIA & DNB
- CRUD Applications for an ATF Core
- Severe Accident Analysis Applications
- Summary EnCore is a registered trademark of Westinghouse Electric Company LLC, its affiliates 1
and/or its subsidiaries in the United States of America and may be registered in other countries throughout the world. All rights reserved. Unauthorized use is strictly prohibited.
Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners."
2
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Westinghouses EnCore Fuel EnCore includes both incremental and Chromium-Coated Silicon Carbide (SiC) game changing products to enable a Zr Cladding Composite Cladding sensible path to achieve full ATF benefits.
EnCore Products:
Advanced Cladding Product Evolution Cr-coated zirconium SiC ADOPT' Pellets Uranium Silicide (U3Si2) Pellets Advanced Fuel ADOPT' doped fuel pellets U3Si2 pellets Photo courtesy of Idaho National Labs ADOPT', EnCore ZIRLO are trademarks or registered trademarks of Westinghouse Electric Company LLC, its affiliates and/or its subsidiaries in the United States of America and may be registered in other countries throughout the world. All rights reserved. Unauthorized use is strictly prohibited. Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners.
3
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
EnCore Fuel Physical Benefits
- ADOPT Pellets
- Higher density ~2%
- Better thermal stability and oxidation resistance
- Lower fission gas release in transients
- Increased PCI margins at high temperatures
- U3Si2 Pellets
- Higher uranium density ~17% improves fuel cycle economics for 18 and 24 month cycles
- Increased thermal conductivity improves fuel thermal performance during transients
- Good irradiation behavior (swelling, fission gas release)
- Coated Claddings
- Higher accident temperature capability for accident conditions (1300 to 1400ºC)
- Reduced corrosion and hydrogen pickup, and resistance to rod wear
- Reduced exothermic reaction energy during high temperature transients,
- Reduced balloon size, higher burst temperature and possible reduction in fuel dispersal
- Improved LOCA PCT and RIA depositions limits and time in DNB for DBAs
- SiC Cladding
- No ballooning and bursting, and resistance to rod wear
- Eliminate oxidation driven temperature spikes
- Maintain integrity under most severe beyond design basis accident conditions, decomposition near ~2000ºC
- Fuel performance beyond DNB and during LOCA can increase design basis margins
- Cladding provides fission product barrier to high temperatures
- Minimizes potential hydrogen generation to non threatening levels These Physical Benefits can be used to assess Plant Benefits for Severe Accidents and DBAs 4
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Safety and Economic Benefits Gen 1 Gen 2 Current Cr-Coated Cr-Coated Cr-Coated Benefit Fuel SiC/U3Si2 Zr/UO2 Zr/ADOPT Zr/U3Si2 Zr/UO2 Pellet U loading +2.0% +17% +17%
Fuel Utilization Grid-to-rod Fretting / Debris Load Follow / Flexibility Higher Burnup LOCA / DBA Margin DNB Margin Hydrogen (10CFR50.44 Margin)
BDBA Margin/Operator Response Times Reference / No Benefit Some / Potential Benefit Large Benefit 5
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Summary of Data Needed for Validation
- Autoclave testing
- In-Rx Exposure (PIE, Hot Cell)
- Burst tests
- Power Ramp tests
- LOCA and RIA tests (TREAT, Studsvik, etc)
- Fretting tests
- Pressure Drop
- WALT Loop DNB and CRUD tests
- Ultra High Temperature, KIT tests
- Fuel Mechanical Behavior tests 6
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
CASL / NEAMS Tools to be Used VERA Mesh / Solution Solvers / UQ Neutronics Transfer DTK PETSc MPACT Shift SCALE/
RETRAN AMPX libMesh Trilinos ORIGEN TRACE MOOSE Thermal-Hydraulics RELAP-7 COBRA-TF STAR-CCM+
DAKOTA Potential Chemistry External Interoperability Common I/O & Visualization Codes that with Reactor MAMBA Support Systems Codes VeraIn/Out VERAView CASL (as needed) Fuel Performance Research BISON VERA-CS tools will support the industry on ATF ParaView VisIt development by simulating neutronic, thermal-hydraulic and fuel performance behavior of cores loaded with ATF 7
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
BISON ATF Applications
- BISON advanced fuel performance modeling will provide critical support for the design of accident tolerant fuel and cladding materials by:
- Providing predictions of expected fuel and cladding behaviors in advance of measurement data to inform design decisions
- Identifying potential performance issues and behavioral trends to inform planning for expensive ATF in-reactor testing
- Providing advance indications of performance thresholds (or cliffs) in ATF materials behaviors
- Providing supplemental results to confirm and guide the development of design fuel performance codes BISON analyses will contribute to the basic understanding of ATF fuel and cladding material behaviors 8
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Example: BISON Application to EnCore Accident Tolerant Fuel (ATF) Application
- BISON used to assess impact of eccentricity in postulated double encapsulated U3Si2 lead test rod design
- Focused on fuel and cladding temperature distribution BISON provides an important tool for evaluating ATF concepts where empirically based codes are limited in scope because of the limited availability of measured data 9
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
BISON Key Milestones
- Modeling of mechanical integrity and thermo-mechanical behavior of coated Zr-based cladding for ATF
- Modeling fission gas release from doped oxide nuclear fuel
- Modeling the plasticity and thermal creep of doped oxide nuclear fuel
- Fission gas and creep in uranium silicide fuel
- ATF material model development and validation for priority fuel concepts (Doped UO2 and U3Si2)
- ATF Mesoscale Material Model Development for priority fuel concepts, use of Atomistic modeling & MARMOT (Doped UO2 and U3Si2)
- Application of BISON for evaluating PCI and Flexible Plant Operation
- Application of BISON for high burnup operation > 62 GWd/MTU Westinghouse will work together with CASL / NEAMs on these key 10 milestones
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
VERA Core Simulations for ATF
- Perform VERA core models for the Westinghouse ATF (Cr-coated cladding and U3Si2 fuel pellet) to support fuel implementation and licensing in commercial reactors, according to the following plan:
- Setup past core models up to the actual cycle for the proposed plant for LTRs and LTAs implementation
- Compare results to measurement for validation
- Model core Loading Pattern for the cycle of ATF introduction, including ATF fuel assembly and fuel rod geometry
- Evaluate results and compare to in-house core physics tools to ensure consistency
- Model ATF region introduction until equilibrium cycle is achieved, including cycle length extension to 24-mo and higher burnups
- Compare results to in-house predictions
- Assess RIA for transition cores and eq. cycle
- Perform economic analysis based on fuel requirements to assess fuel cycle savings from ATF introduction 11
Westinghouse Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Example: AP1000 PWR Analysis 3D VERA-CS Model of the AP1000 PWR First Core
- HZP calculations
- Comparison of global and local parameters indicated excellent numerical agreement between VERA-CS, Monte Carlo predictions, and ANC/PARAGON, reinforcing confidence in the startup predictions.
- HFP calculations
- Lattice depletion simulations at HFP conditions with VERA-CS, PARAGON2, and Serpent showed excellent agreement
- Core depletion simulations performed with VERA-CS and ANC/PARAGON2, demonstrating excellent agreement, Cycle 1 Hot Full Power (HFP) Cycle 1 HFP MSHIM' Strategy confirming the Westinghouse design All Rods Out (ARO) Depletion Control Depletion values for the AP1000 PWR first core.
Startup Measurement Comparisons ARO Boron 7 ppm ITC pcm/°F 0.5 Max/Min Rod 3.9%/-1.6%
12 Worth % pcm
Westinghouse Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Example: Watts Bar Unit 2 Startup Simulations Raw and Vanadium Detector Response M-P Soluble Boron during Power Ascension Testing Radial Detector Segment Differences (C-M,%)
With the help of VERA results, Westinghouse was able to refine its in-house models (e.g.,
detailed explicit WABA, reflector constants, cross-section library based on ENDF/B-VII.1 data, etc.)
13
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
VERA Application for RIA & DNB
- An objective is to simulate RIA transients for cores with ATF.
In particular, U3Si2 fuel with its higher thermal conductivity and lower melting temperature will be analyzed under various rod ejection scenarios to evaluate its performance (margin to melting temperatures) and its transient characteristics (e.g., impact of lower fuel temperatures on Doppler feedback).
- Another objective is to simulate locked rotor transients to evaluate improvements on reduction/prevention of rods-in-DNB fuel failure from ATF cladding features 14
Westinghouse Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Example: AP1000 PWR Rod Ejection Analysis
- REA simulated at End of Cycle (EOC) HZP, HFP, and part-power
- Full core geometry using MPACT coupled with CTF
- Highly asymmetric power distribution
- VERA-CS is capable of simulating full core geometry REA in a stable manner with the expected power pulse resulting from a superprompt critical reactivity insertion and the resulting negative Doppler reactivity feedback With high-fidelity simulation capabilities, VERA-CS is positioned to support the industry on analyzing reactivity initiated accidents for ATF, and to assist in responding to regulatory rule changes 15
Westinghouse Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
CRUD Application for an ATF Core Advanced Analyses of CRUD Use of VERA to predict Boron distribution in CRUD Boron Distribution in a proposed
- Performed for each iteration until convergence Reactor Core Loading Pattern between all three is achieved
- Explicitly including the feedback of boron on
- Repeated for each depletion step in simulation power distribution and calculating A/O of plant operation VERA-MAMBA will be performed for an ATF core to look at impact of cladding surface on CIPS, CILC and DNB 16
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Severe Accident Analysis Applications
- Westinghouse performing MAAP calculations to evaluate coping time benefits of ATF and use of FLEX equipment with ATF for flow and passive heat mitigation strategies
- Need to compare results to DOE calculations using MELCOR
- Implement latest ATF fuel mechanical behavior data and models into severe accident codes
Westinghouse Non-Proprietary Class 3 © 2018 Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Summary
- With the help of the DOE tools, it is recognized that advanced M&S techniques can inform decisions for the next generation of advanced fuel designs and new generation reactors (e.g. eVinci micro-reactor and Lead Fast Reactor), as well as help in the resolution of any anomalous core behavior in existing LWRs
- Westinghouse plans to use DOE tools to help benchmark our design tools for ATF and better inform testing needed for validation
- The use of DOE tools together with validation data will help understand margin and uncertainty of ATF safety and economic benefits 18
Modeling and Simulation of MSRs MSR TWG Nicholas Smith Southern Company Services
ONE TWO THREE FOUR Molten Salt Terra Power Thorcon Terrestrial Energy Flibe Energy Reactor Fast Thermal Burner Thermal Thermal TWG Breeder Liquid Fuel Liquid Fuel Salt Cooled Burner Liquid Fuel Breeder Liquid Fuel Salt Cooled Thorium Salt Cooled Salt Cooled Uranium Uranium Thorium (Could use Th) (Could use Th)
FIVE SIX SEVEN Muons Elysium Alpha Technology Inc. Industries Corporation Thermal Fast Thermal Burner Breeder Breeder Liquid Fuel Liquid Fuel Liquid Fuel Salt Cooled Salt Cooled Salt Cooled Uranium Uranium Thorium
Thermal Fast MSR Design Space Thorium Fuel Type Uranium Neutron Spectrum
TerraPowers Molten Chloride Fast Reactor (MCFR) advances nuclear in key areas
- No fuel fabrication
- Online refueling
- High temperature
- Non-reactive coolant
- Strong negative temperature
& void coefficients
- Near-zero excess reactivity
- Only startup enrichment
- Consume DU, NatU, and/or UNF
- Start with partial UNF load
- No ongoing enrichment
- Strong non-proliferation traits
- Reduced water use
- Opens up non-electric markets
- Actinides stay in core, daughter core, or closely-coupled clean-up system
- Actinides always mixed with lanthanides Copyright © 2017 TerraPower, LLC. All Rights Reserved. 5
Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor (LFTR)
Design objectives:
600 MWt/250 MWe modular core conversion ratio >= 1.0 Replaceable core internals fuel salt in graphite tubes Reactor vessel shielded by thorium blanket and graphite reflector Materials and fluids:
7LiF-BeF2-UF4 fuel salt 7LiF-BeF -ThF blanket salt 2 4 7LiF-BeF coolant salt 2
Graphite moderator and reflector Hastelloy-N reactor vessel and piping
A Mu*STAR system can be installed at each of 60 utility sites in the US to convert the SNF stored in pools and casks to fluoride salts, to burn it there for > 200 years, and to give new life to a reactor community while addressing many concerns of SNF storage and transport.
500 MWe MSR
- Thermal spectrum - Uranium Fluoride Salt
- Leverage shipyard construction techniques
- Build upon success of MSRE - Floating reactor towed to site
- Cost competitive with coal ($1.2B/GWe, 3 cents/kwhr). Targetting two years order to grid.
Elysium Industries Molten Chloride Salt Fast Reactor (MCSFR)
Safety Economic Competitiveness Low Environmental Impact Design Objectives Efficient Nuclear Fuel Use Enhance Non-Proliferation and Safeguards Plant Concept Safety & Proliferation Resistance
- Low operating pressure - Fuel < Secondary
- 1 GWe/2.5GWth
- Secondary Tcold > Fuel Tm.p.
- Chloride fuel salts
- Negative reactivity/void coefficients,
- Fast spectrum neutron flux
- self regulating/shutdown
- Fuel drain system
- Breeding ratio ~1
- No actinide removal/separation
- Core outlet: ~ 600 ºC
- Simple Chlorine based soluble fission product removal
- Core inlet: ~ 500 ºC
- FP Vitrification with Cl recycling
- Passive corrosion control
- High TRL purification systems
- Passive safety, incl. decay heat removal
- Design for maintainability
- No exothermic reactions
- Fuel Flexible: DU/LEU/SNF/RGPu/WGPu/Th
- Low excess reactivity Reactor Core Monte-Carlo CFD Computational Design Approach Design Neutron Flux Salt Temperature Chemical Analysis
- Integrated Physics-Fluid design methodology
- Computational chemical analysis
- Test & validate 10
Technology Comparison Gen IV Technology Type LWR SFR HTGR FHR MSR High Temperature Low Pressure Online Refueling Sustainable Fuel Cycle High Power Density Multiple Fuel Cycle Options Complete Walkaway Safety 30+ Years of R&D 11
Engagement with Regulatory issues DOE and National Labs Consensus standards Functional containment MSR National Campaign related to MSRs Fuel qualification NEAMS
DOE has directly engaged the MSR TWG
- MSR Chemistry Workshop in April of 2017
- Technology and Applied R&D Needs for Molten Salt Chemistry, Innovative Approaches to Accelerate MSR Development and Deployment - Final Report
- GAIN support for MSR TWG activities - connection to SMEs within National Lab complex
- Establishment of DOE Advanced Reactor Technologies (ART) MSR Campaign
- NEAMS Software Workshop for MSR TWG in March of 2018
- Led directly to GAIN voucher applications from industry to collaborate with NEAMS developers
MSR Developers intend on using neutronics, thermal hydraulics, structural mechanical, and systems codes based on features and V&V strategy Each developer is approaching Mod/Sim independently - there is no cookie cutter set of tools Code independence - can NRC and industry use the same codes?
Plans for experimental facilities Separate Integrated Large Component Criticality Demonstration Effects Tests Effects Tests Test Facility Experiments Reactor 2016-2019 2017-2020 2019-2022 2020-2024 2022-2027
MSR TWG Perspective on DOE Codes Some DOE codes have strong user support while others require direct developer hand holding to utilize In order for industry to adopt these codes they must have similar usability and support to commercial codes We would like to see DOE pay to V&V their own codes against our experiments We have commercialization timelines that prevent DOE code development from being on critical path
What are we missing?
Predictive chemistry and effective MSR fuel performance code Coupled fast spectrum neutronics and thermal hydraulics transient code MSR mechanistic source term code Salt physical properties and chemistry data Salt irradiation experiment data Optimized MSR licensing pathway
KAIROS POWER MODELING AND SIMULATION PLANS NOVEMBER 16, 2018 A D V I S O R Y C O M M I T T E E O N R E A C TO R S A F E G U A R D S THERMAL HYDRAULIC SUBCOMMITTEE Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Agenda
- Introduction to the Kairos Power FHR Design
- Current Codes Selected for License Basis Event Modeling
- Ongoing Development and Testing to Prepare Codes for Licensing Interactions Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 2
Kairos Powers mission is to enable the worlds transition to clean energy, with the ultimate goal of dramatically improving peoples quality of life while protecting the environment.
Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 3
Kairos Power FHR Technology Basis Coated Particle Fuel Liquid Fluoride Salt Coolants Low-Pressure Pool Vessel
[High Temperature Gas Reactors] [Molten Salt Reactors] [Sodium Fast Reactors]
Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 4
Basic System Configuration with Steam Cycle Highlights
- Minimal/no valves in primary
- Accommodate system heat up and cool down, with salt transfers
- Intermediate loop will leverage technology and suppliers of Concentrated Solar Power
- Enable multiple Ultimate Heat Sink options
- Tritium Management strategy is applied over the entire plant Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 5
Fuel Particles and Pebbles
- Core design is a pebble bed concept within a graphite reflector Pebbles are positively buoyant in Flibe
- Fuel particles:
Tri-structural isotropic (TRISO)-coated fuel particles embedded in a matrix material Silicon carbide coating on fuel particles is the primary fission product barrier Pyrolytic carbon layers and matrix are secondary barriers
- Pebble handling system monitors condition and burnup Individual pebble transit is on the order of several months Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 6
FHR Safety Case is Rooted in the Robust Intrinsic Safety Characteristics of the Fuel and Coolant Combination
- TRISO Fuel Demonstrated FP retention up to 1600° C FHRs operate with uniquely large fuel temperature margins No incremental fuel failure expected during postulated accidents
- Flibe Coolant Demonstrated retention of solid fission products and iodine MSRE ~ FHR Test with 100% Fuel Failure Low pressure coolant reduces stored energy in reactor cavity and building
- Low Pressure Primary System Loss of pressure boundary does not result in large pressure related energy releases Additional defense-in-depth may be provided by retention of any fission products released from the primary circuit in low pressure reactor building structures.
7 Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 7
Evaluation Model Development
- The aggressive timeline for deployment of the KP-FHR requires rapid maturity of the simulation tools used in the evaluation models.
Rapid down selection of possible tools Use of internal Phenomena Identification and Ranking Table process to define early required modeling phenomena and inform the testing plan for validation.
- Leverage the extensive testing capability being developed at Kairos to fill in assessment base and generate validation data as needed.
Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 8
Safety Related Code Development at Kairos
- The KP-FHR safety case is phenomenologically different than the current LWR fleet
- The robust TRISO fuel form with failure temperatures above 1600°C Molten Salt (Flibe) as the primary coolant with a melting point of ~460°C and boiling point of
~1430°C Structural SS316 Vessel From the above phenomenology we chose the following key development efforts for safety related codes include:
- SAM: Dedicated safety related transient systems analysis tool being developed for KP-FHR.
Co-development with Argonne National Laboratory.
Model Needs and Code Development Plan (CDP) in place and development underway.
- BISON: TRISO fuel performance prediction tool.
Co-Development with Idaho National Laboratory.
Model Needs and Code Development Plan (CDP) in place and development underway.
- GRIZZLY: High temperature core structural materials analysis tool (Slide 14,15 Refs).
Co-Development with Idaho National Laboratory.
Model Needs and CDP still to be created.
- PARCS/AGREE: Porous media based thermal hydraulics code with coupled neutronics module for core transient analysis.
Co-Development with the University of Michigan.
Model Needs established. CDP under development.
Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 9
Kairos Power Nuclear Development Paradigm Conventional Nuclear Development Cycle PLAN DESIGN BUILD TEST TEST EXPERIENCE Kairos Power Accelerated Test Cycles for Innovation and Optimization PLAN DESIGN BUILD TEST PLAN DESIGN BUILD TEST PLAN DESIGN BUILD TEST Test Test Experience Experience TEST EXPERIENCE 10 Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 10
Testing for Design, Safety, Validation R RAPID LAB Rapid Analysis, Prototyping, and Iterative Design Lab (R-LAB)
S SALT LAB Salt Handling and Loop Testing Lab (S-LAB)
T TESTING FACILITY Component Testing Facility (T-FACILITY)
User Operations & Maintenance U USER FACILITY Training Facility (U-FACILITY)
Prototypic integrated systems test Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 11
Kairos Powers RAPID-Lab for Iterative Testing for Design, Safety, Validation Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 12
Closing Remarks
- Kairos is committed to validation of advanced modeling and simulation tools applied to the KP-FHR.
- To support this effort we are collaborating with the DOE labs and code owners to accelerate the remaining development.
- Comprehensive testing program used in a unique way to support the design and validation of simulation tools.
- Ready to work with NRC and ACRS in a transparent fashion with ongoing interaction on code development and application.
Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 13
Grizzly: Nuclear Power Plant Component Aging
- MOOSE-based simulation code for aging in nuclear power plant systems, components, and structures
- Used to model both aging processes and the ability of age-degraded components to safely function
- Intended to be used for a variety of components. Current applications:
- LWR reactor pressure vessels
- Concrete structures
- Areas of current development for advanced reactors:
- High-temperature creep
- Creep-fatigue and creep-fracture Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 14
Grizzly Engineering-Scale Applications:
LWR Reactor Pressure Vessels Concrete Structures
- Multidimensional modeling of global
- Coupled physics models of heat & moisture response during transients transport and mechanics
- Fracture models with Monte Carlo sampling
- Models for volumetric expansion due to alkali-compute probability of fracture initiation silica reaction (ASR) and radiation-induced volumetric expansion (RIVE)
B. Spencer, W. Hoffman, and M. Backman. Modular system for probabilistic fracture mechanics analysis of embrittled reactor pressure vessels in the Grizzly code, Nuclear Engineering and Design, 341:25- H. Huang, B. W. Spencer, and G. Cai. Grizzly model of multi-species reactive 37, Jan. 2019. diffusion, moisture/heat transfer and alkali-silica reaction in concrete.
INL/EXT-15-36425, Idaho National Laboratory, Idaho Falls, ID, September 2015.
Increased failure probability at stress concentration Copyright © 2018 Kairos Power LLC. All Rights Reserved. 15
X-energy: Modelling & Simulation Computer Codes User Needs for Advanced (non-LWR) Reactor Safety Martin van Staden Analysis and Accident Tolerant Fuels VP Design Engineering (ATF) in LWR Safety Analysis November 16, 2018
© 2018 X Energy, LLC, all rights reserved Nuclear Energy. Reimagined.
Outline X-energy Design Introduction to our Design Safety Basis Main Physics to Support Safety Case Neutronics Codes Thermal / Flow Codes Source Term Codes Summary Note: This presentation only addresses codes of interest to the ACRS Thermal Hydraulics subcommittee (neutronics, thermal / flow analysis, and mechanistic source term).
Structural and seismic analysis codes planned for use are not addressed herein.
© 2018 X Energy, LLC, all rights reserved Nuclear Energy. Reimagined. 2
Pebble Bed High Temperature Gas Reactor Plant features / attributes include:
- Use of well proven UCO TRISO based fuel
- Proven intrinsic safety
- Operated without the need for a water source
- Load-following to 40% power within 15 minutes
- Continuous online fueling with passive on-site spent fuel storage
- Requires less time to construct (2.5 to 4 years)
- Factory assembled road transportable components/systems
- Deployable for electricity generation, process heat or co-generation
© 2018 X Energy, LLC, all rights reserved Nuclear Energy. Reimagined. 3
UCO TRISO Particle - Primary Fission Product Barrier 0.425 mm 0.855 mm 19 000 60 mm TRISO coated 220 000 UCO kernel pebbles in particles in a the core pebble Primary safety goal is to ensure that fission products are retained within the TRISO coated fuel particles to the maximum extent possible TRISO Fuel particle coatings provide multiple fission product barrier The analysis challenge is to predict fuel temperature and source term within a randomly packed pebble bed during normal operation and loss of forced flow conditions
© 2018 X Energy, LLC, all rights reserved Nuclear Energy. Reimagined. 4
Design Safety Basis - Supported by Analysis Tools Safety Function Control Criticality Control Heat Removal Contain Fission Products
- Low power density
- Low power density
- High retention capability
- Low excess reactivity
- Strong negative of fission products in
- Strong negative temperature coefficient coated particles (99.99%)
Design temperature coefficient
- Fixed phase heat
- High temperature Selection /
- Fixed phase moderator transport fluid tolerance during loss of Feature (graphite)
- Large thermal inertia forced heat removal
- Online refueling
- Large pressure vessel
- Multiple independent
- Large thermal inertia surface area to remove physical barriers heat passively Neutronics analysis Neutronics analysis Neutronics analysis Analysis Tools Thermal and flow analysis Thermal and flow analysis Thermal and flow analysis Fuel Performance analysis Bold text indicates fuel design features
© 2018 X Energy, LLC, all rights reserved Nuclear Energy. Reimagined. 5
Main Factors Affecting Fuel Performance Fuel
- Moving fuel depletion calculations are needed to Fuel Burnup predict burnup UCO kernel Porous Carbon Pyrolytic Carbon Silicon Carbide
- Source term analysis takes fuel quality into Pyrolytic Carbon Fuel Quality account
© 2018 X Energy, LLC, all rights reserved Nuclear Energy. Reimagined. 6
Factors Directly Impacting Fuel Temperature
- Power profile obtained from Power neutronics codes coupled thermal flow calculations
- Calculated using CFD with Heat Transfer validated porous media approach
- Use extensive material property Material data as a function of Properties temperature and fluence
© 2018 X Energy, LLC, all rights reserved Nuclear Energy. Reimagined. 7
X-energy Neutronics / Thermal flow / Source term Codes Functionality Currently used for Conceptual Design Planned Code Development NEAMS Codes Cross-section generation for Full Core ENDFB-IV,V, JEF-1 ENDFB-VII.x ENDFB-VII.x Analysis VSOP (GAM-ZUT-THERMOS) SCALE (CENTRM-SHIFT) MC2-3/PROTEUS 2/3D steady state full core neutronics VSOP (CITATION,THERMIX-KONVEK) PARCS-AGREE or PARCS- MC2-3/PROTEUS or
& thermal/flow FLOWNEX or PARCS-STAR-CCM+ MAMOTH-PRONGHORN Neutronics Fuel Management and Burnup (i.e. VSOP (ORIGEN-JUL, NAKURE) ORIGEN 6.2 - MIXICLE ORIGEN (pebble fuel movement) shuffling not supported)
Time-dependent neutronics & MGT, STAR-CCM+ and FLOWNEX PARCS-AGREE or PARCS- RATTLESNAKE-thermal/flow FLOWNEX or PARCS-STAR-CCM+ PRONGHORN Higher order neutronics for shielding, MCNP SHIFT MC2-verification, and UQ MCNP 3/PROTEUS/DIABLO Thermal/flow High fidelity thermal/flow for STAR-CCM+ STAR-CCM+ NEK-5000 verification and UQ NEK-5000 Graphite Corrosion MGT, STAR-CCM+ XSTERM (XCORR)
System/Plant Analysis FLOWNEX FLOWNEX SAM Source term Fuel performance and radionuclide XSTERM (XFP, XGAS, XOL) XSTERM (XFP, XGAS, XOL) BISON (limited TRISO release capability)
Tritium, dust deposition and XSTERM (XTRIT,XDUST, XHPB, XRB, XSTERM (XDUST, XHPB, XRB, resuspension, RN transport XDIS) XDIS)
Color Legend: Legacy codes US/DOE Codes X-energy in house code Commercial NQA-1 Code
© 2018 X Energy, LLC, all rights reserved Nuclear Energy. Reimagined. 8
Neutronics Codes Roadmap Development Conceptual design has utilized legacy pebble bed design codes - VSOP-A, VSOP 99 (Quasi-Steady State) and MGT (Transient) - Proven track record but currently without technical support Worked with the DOE Labs (INL, ORNL, SNL, ANL) and University of Michigan to review existing US/ DOE codes in order to develop a comprehensive roadmap specifying the capability to simulate pebble bed reactors The Neutronics code Roadmap identifies two parallel paths:
Legacy codes
- Complete Conceptual design (VSOP-A, VSOP-99,
- Perform bench marks MGT)
- Ensure process to meet 10 CFR 50 Appendix B requirements Neutronics Road Map NRC License US/DOE codes
- Develop required features for US/DOE Codes (SCALE, PARCS,
- Link Codes using NEAMS work bench ORIGEN 6.2,
- Ensure codes meet 10 CFR 50 Appendix B requirements MIXICLE)
Color Legend: Legacy codes US/DOE Codes X-energy in house code Commercial NQA-1 Code
© 2018 X Energy, LLC, all rights reserved Nuclear Energy. Reimagined. 9
Thermal Flow Roadmap Development Two main requirements:
- Component/sub system analysis : transient / steady state (i.e. core structures, reactor, etc.)
- System level analysis: transient / steady state (entire primary & secondary loop)
Commercial NQA-1 codes for thermal and fluid flow:
- STAR-CCM+ detailed CFD subsystem and component analysis Developed in house Porous Media Heat Transfer Approach (PM-HTA) user coding for STAR-CCM+
- FLOWNEX Nuclear DOE Codes that will be used:
- NEK5000 - high fidelity verification and validation for pebble bed heat transfer
- AGREE coupled to PARCS for thermal /
gas flow - coupled neutronics Color Legend: Legacy codes US/DOE Codes X-energy in house code Commercial NQA-1 Code
© 2018 X Energy, LLC, all rights reserved Nuclear Energy. Reimagined. 10
Source Term Calculation Source Term Path Element / Form / State Mechanism Physical Phenomena Methods / Software Isotope Codes Releases from Iodine Gaseous FPs - Release from TRISO Temperature, irradiation VSOP-A, VSOP-99, MGT TRISO fuel Silver Metallic FPs particles into matrix time, fast fluence, SCALE, PARCS, OREGIN particles Strontium graphite burnup, particle defects, FLOWNEX, STAR-CCM+
Cesium - Activation of impurities contamination XS-Term Iodine, Silver Gaseous FPs - Diffusion from pebble Temperature, irradiation VSOP-A, VSOP-99, MGT Releases from Strontium Metallic FPs into the helium stream time, fast fluence, SCALE, PARCS, OREGIN fuel elements Cesium Dust Particles - Activation of impurities burnup, contamination FLOWNEX, STAR-CCM+
(pebbles) XS-Term Iodine, Silver Gaseous FPs - Leakage from HPB into Instrumentation line ORIGEN Strontium, Metallic FPs building and structures failure, XS-Term Releases from Cesium Dust Particles - Activation of impurities small & large pipe breaks, Pressure plate-out, liftoff boundary Iodine, Silver Gaseous FPs - Transport throughout Plate-out, liftoff XS-Term Strontium, Metallic FPs building to the MELCOR Releases from Cesium Dust Particles environment building Iodine, Silver Gaseous FPs - Atmospheric dispersion Postulates XS-Term Strontium, IodineMetallic FPs - Ingestion STAR-CCM+
Cesium Silver Dust Particles Max dose at Cesium site boundary Dust Color Legend: Legacy codes US/DOE Codes X-energy in house code Commercial NQA-1 Code
© 2018 X Energy, LLC, all rights reserved Nuclear Energy. Reimagined. 11
Summary For conceptual design X-energy has had to rely on legacy neutronics codes as DOE codes with the ability to model moving fuel are not presently available and need to be developed X-energy has collaborated with the DOE labs to identify the gaps in existing DOE codes that need to be addressed in time to support final design and licensing of the Xe-100 reactor It is of extreme importance for X-energy to meet the time scales outlined in our code development roadmaps in order to achieve our target deployment date - these time scales have influenced choices made in the various road maps X-energy needs a commitment from DOE to support specific development of DOE codes to ensure DOE codes have the required capability to model pebble bed reactors We also need close collaboration and interaction with the NRC to move these roadmaps forward and to ensure regulatory requirements and expectations are met
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NuScale Collaboration with CASL & NEAMS November 16th, 2018 PM-1118-62930 Revision: 0 Copyright © 2018 by NuScale Power LLC NuScale Nonproprietary Template #: 0000-20955-F01 R8
2 Acknowledgement & Disclaimer This material is based upon work supported by the Department of Energy under Award Number DE-NE0000633.
This report was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States (U.S.) Government. Neither the U.S.
Government nor any agency thereof, nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the U.S.
Government or any agency thereof. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the U.S.
Government or any agency thereof.
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3 Agenda
- NuScale interactions with CASL to date
- Support During the Subchannel Codes Selection
- VERA Training
- Assessment of CRUD build-up in NPM
- Future Projects
- NuScale interactions with NEAMS to date
- NuScale observations on Advanced ModSim development PM-1118-62930 NuScale Nonproprietary Revision: 0 Copyright © 2018 by NuScale Power, LLC Template #: 0000-20955-F01 R8
4 Support during Subchannel Codes Selection
- During subchannel codes and methodology strategy selection, (2014) collaboration with CASL was valuable
- CASL compared CTF (part of VERA-CS) results against historical experiments with NuScale-specific types of phenomena (e.g., GE 3x3, etc.)
- CASL-provided results helped establish the path for the development of NuScale subchannel methodology.
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5 VERA Training
- In-house VERA training was successfully conducted by ORNL staff for 10 NuScale engineers in June of 2018
- The scope of the VERA training covered :
- VERA-CS Overview
- VERA_CS Input description
- NuScale SMR-specific full core coupled simulation
- NuScale is currently working to define updated priorities and preferences for additional work/support to be provided under the CASL directive using the VERA-CS code.
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6 Assessment of CRUD build-up in NPM
- The primary focus of the CRUD Test Stand activities was to perform a preliminary CRUD analysis to forecast the operational CRUD behavior.
- The Test Stand activities included the development of VERA model of the NuScale SMR, code-to-code comparisons, and coupled VERA neutronic and thermal-hydraulics simulations of eight fuel cycles to achieve equilibrium operating conditions for the CRUD analyses.
- VERA demonstrated excellent capabilities to model nuclear performance of the NuScale core and consistency with results from multiple industry standard codes such as MCNP, KENO-VI, CASMO5, and SIMULATE5.
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7 Future Projects
- Use a combination of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and VERA-CS for multidimensional assessment of the reactor core flow and boron distribution.
- Continue collaboration on the development of the CRUD assessment methodology PM-1118-62930 NuScale Nonproprietary Revision: 0 Copyright © 2018 by NuScale Power, LLC Template #: 0000-20955-F01 R8
8 NuScale interactions with NEAMS to date
- The Reactor Product Line of the NEAMS project has developed flow-induced vibration (FIV) analysis capabilities to support industry and specifically integral, small modular reactors using the SHARP code (consists of Diablo for structural mechanics and Nek5000 for fluid mechanics).
- There is very limited research in the area of FIV for helical tube steam generators. The NEAMS project has performed in-air FIV experiments of helical coil test sections to increase the body of experimental results related to helical tubes and to benchmark the SHARP analysis methods. Having additional experimental data and alternate software tools and design analysis methods to perform FIV calculations are of great benefit to demonstrating the safety of the NuScale steam generator design.
- Continued development of the SHARP capabilities including two-way coupling is beneficial for NuScale, as the FIV mechanisms with the lowest safety margins for the NuScale design include strongly-coupled mechanisms such as vortex shedding and fluid elastic instability. Because NuScale is a natural circulation design, this represents a difference compared to most tradition reactor plant designs where turbulence is the primary focus of the Regulatory Guide 1.20 comprehensive vibration assessment program. Continued collaboration between NuScale and NEAMS as we generate modal and flow testing validation results will be useful to demonstrate the safety of the NuScale design and provide improved simulation methods for FIV.
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9 NuScale Observations on Advanced ModSim Development
- Nuclear Industry (including NuScale) may get significant benefits from the usage of the advanced reactor modeling tools (ModSim).
- However, the positive impact could be more pronounced in case of applying ModSim suites nearer-term from a licensing standpoint rather than from the R&D standpoint. Therefore, the idea of considering step-by-step licensing of ModSim code suites like VERA CS and getting generic SER would be a great step forward for the industry.
- Participation of the NuScale and other companies in the Advanced ModSim commercialization effort can help to push the process forward. If needed, NuScale can participate in this effort.
- Code suites could be improved via implementation of generic and industry-specific proprietary modules. For example, dynamically linked libraries for CHF and other modeling choices could significantly improve the usability of the software products.
- Involvement of CASL & NEAMS in industry projects could improved via User Groups (e.g., using voting options within the groups).
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10 Azat Galimov Engineer IV agalimov@nuscalepower.com PM-1118-62930 NuScale Nonproprietary Revision: 0 Copyright © 2018 by NuScale Power, LLC Template #: 0000-20955-F01 R8
Computer Codes User Needs for Advanced Reactor Safety Analysis November 16, 2018
Fast Reactor Working Group Multiple developers working on multiple technologies Spans variety of fast reactor technologies in development Various coolants, various fuels ARC Columbia Basin Elysium Industries Flibe Energy General Atomics GE Hydromine Oklo TerraPower Westinghouse Duke Exelon Southern Studsvik Scandpower EPRI NEI 2
Developer perspectives Different needs across the various stages of development and commercialization Conceptualization Design Licensing Operation 3
Fast reactor perspectives Various phenomenology of interest across designs Various fuel cycle missions Long-lived cores Used fuel consumption Breed and burn Single phase coolant behavior Heat transfer characteristics of liquid metals Generally tightly-coupled core designs Fluid fuel considerations 4
Code options Advanced tools Each developer NEAMS pursuing their own Legacy tools modeling and simulation strategy In-house codes according to their Commercial codes respective designs 5
Analysis areas Reactor Thermal Fuel physics hydraulics performance Structural and Source term mechanical Risk analysis analysis analysis 6
Reactor physics Cross section generation Deterministic NJOY PROTEUS MC2-3 Rattlesnake (Can use Monte Carlo XS gen) PERSENT DIF3D REBUS Monte Carlo ERANOS MCNP PARCS Serpent ORIGEN OpenMC Industry codes Shift 7
Thermal hydraulics Subchannel/channel SE2-ANL (SUPERENERGY)
SAM COBRA CFD (FEA)
PRONGHORN Nek5000 ANSYS System STAR-CCM+
SAM ABAQUS SAS4A/SASSYS TRACE RELAP Flownex 8
Fuel performance Structural/mechanical Bison NUBOW-3D Marmot Diablo LIFE-METAL FRAPCON/FRAPTRAN ANSYS ABAQUS SAS4A/SASSYS STAR-CCM+
Risk analysis Source term ADAPT SAS4A/SASSYS CONTAIN-LMR GOTHIC MELCOR 9
Validation Validation bases exist to varying degrees for the different designs Large experimental data sets for sodium cooled systems and metallic fuel Highlighted by EBR-II and associated ALMR/IFR programs 10
General summary Diverse reactor designs and modeling and simulation considerations Variety of modeling and simulation options for design and licensing including legacy codes and advanced codes Varying degrees of validation bases Modern frameworks enable easier and more flexible integration and use Developers pursuing the best options to meet their needs Industry working with DOE and the national labs to advance these tools 11
Questions?
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Appendix 13
Fuels Variety of fuels considered Metal, oxide, nitride, carbide, salt 7 developers considering metal fuel Robust fuel behavior can enhance the safety case Fuel changing phase is not necessarily fuel failure, it can be a safety benefit Coolant system can play an important role as a barrier to radionuclide release Operational considerations Leakers do not necessarily impede operations 14
Metal Fuel Experience Metal fuel is a mature technology and the phenomena of interest are well characterized Over 130000 pins irradiated in EBR-II and over 1000 pins irradiated in FFTF In-core tests 1986 SHRT tests Also involved 40 startup cycles, 8 overpowers, 45 loss of flow tests RBCB tests TREAT tests Out of pile tests Resilient to variations in manufacturing techniques and tolerant of impurities 15
Fuel Design Variations Extend operating envelope of metal fuels - e.g. advanced metal fuels Next generation cladding materials Alternative fuel materials Carbides, nitrides, UZrH, cermets, etc.
16
Historical Reports and Data Metal fuel reports and data Supporting documentation of applicable metallic fuel transient tests, including as-built data packages, as-run conditions, PIE results, and supporting documentation Legacy and modern fast reactor fuel experimental reports and data Experimental data on UO2, UN, UC, and advanced metal fuel irradiation performance Experimental data on cladding materials NaSCoRD (formerly CREDO) database of component reliability for liquid metal reactors 17