Thermal analysis of the heat exchanger for a spent nuclear fuel storage pool

A numerical solution is provided to predict the transient temperature distribution of both fluids in the U-tube heat exchanger of a spent nuclear fuel storage pool. A finite element method, with the Galerkin approach, is used to solve the set of five partial differential equations of energy conservations, with arbitrary inlet and boundary conditions. The results are obtained with very low computation time, through a computer program on a CDC 730, which can be easily linked to other thermal hydraulic codes for the storage pool.To show the capabilities of the program, some results are presented, concerning step response and other transient operations of the exchanger.The validation of the method has been performed comparing the numerical results with the exact steady state analytical solutions available in literature; the agreement is very satisfactory