Marcum Research Group

The restart of the Transient Reactor Test (TREAT) facility combined with the shutdown of the Halden reactor in Norway lead to an increased interest in mimicking Reactivity Initiated Accident (RIA) events conditions for Light Water Reactor within TREAT itself. One of the engineering challenges for this task is to increase the energy deposition rate on the tested fuel element by shortening the width of the power burst from its current 89 msec down to 40 msec. One of the options proposed by Idaho National Laboratory consists of pressurizing rapidly a specially designed hollow control rod with Helium-3. The insertion of negative reactivity in the form of Helium-3, a strong neutron absorber, must be well predicted and repeatable. In this prospect, an out-of-pile prototype, the Helium Negative Reactivity Insertion (HENRI) facility, has been designed and built at Oregon State University to assess the feasibility, the repeatability and the control of such process. Tests have been performed to assess the effect of the driving pressure and the minimum opening area. These tests, although performed with rupture disks, helped shed light on the physics occurring in the system and gain confidence in the predictability of the helium density evolution. The latter is critical to characterize properly the effect of the Helium-3 injection on the overall core reactivity.

Guillaume Mignot Assistant Professor Senior Research Faculty School of Nuclear Science and Engineering Oregon State University  Corvallis, OR 97331 Office: 541-737-3579 Guillaume.Mignot@oregonstate.edu

Principle Investigator

Wade Marcum Senior Associate Dean and Associate Dean for Undergraduate Programs Henry W. and Janice J. Schuette Professor in Nuclear Science and Engineering School of Nuclear Science and Engineering Oregon State University Corvallis, OR 97331 Office: 541-737-3018 Wade.Marcum@oregonstate.edu