Design Features and Steady-State Analysis of 10 MWt Regional Energy Reactor

Being one of the integral-type PWR, REX-10 is a small-sized nuclear reactor designed to generate the thermal power of 10 MW with ultra-long life core. REX-10 is intended to provide the small-scale electricity and the nuclear district heating. Its design philosophy is based on the preferred realization of inherent safety, economical efficiency and non-proliferation. The reactor assemblies are equipped with advanced and compact components inside the reactor vessel. Unique technical features and reactor system designs of REX-10 are presented in this paper. To confirm the main design decisions of the system, the steady- state experimental and computational studies are performed. A series of steady-state experiments are performed in REX-10 Test Facility (RTF), a scaled- down test apparatus to substantiate the capability of natural circulation cooling of REX-10. Using the TASS/SMR-S code, the test data from the RTF experiments at various core power are simulated. The primary mass flow rate and the stabilized coolant temperature predicted by TASS/SMR-S code show general agreement with test data, which indicates that TASS/SMR-S can be applied to verify the design parameters of prototypical REX-10. The calculated system thermal-hydraulic parameters are compared with the design data of REX-10.