Thermal Response of the Hybrid Loop-Pool Design for Sodium Cooled Faster Reactors

An innovative hybrid loop-pool design for the sodium cooled fast reactor (SFR) has been recently proposed with the primary objective of achieving cost reduction and safety enhancement. With the hybrid loop-pool design, closed primary loops are immersed in a secondary buffer tank. This design takes advantage of features from conventional both pool and loop designs to further improve economics and safety. This paper will briefly introduce the hybrid loop-pool design concept and present the calculated thermal responses for unproctected (without reactor scram) loss of forced circulation (ULOF) transients using RELAP5-3D. The analyses examine both the inherent reactivity shutdown capability and decay heat removal performance by passive safety systems