Spent fuel pool analysis using TRACE code

Abstract

The storage requirements of Spent Fuel Pools have been analyzed with the purpose to increase their rack capacities. In the past, the thermal limits have been mainly evaluated with conservative codes developed for this purpose, although some works can be found in which a best estimate code is used. The use of best estimate codes is interesting as they provide more realistic calculations and they have the capability of analyzing a wide range of transients that could affect the Spent Fuel Pool. Two of the most representative thermal-hydraulic codes are RELAP-5 and TRAC. Nowadays, TRACE code is being developed to make use of the more favorable characteristics of RELAP-5 and TRAC codes. Among the components coded in TRACE that can be used to construct the model, it is interesting to use the VESSEL component, which has the capacity of reproducing three dimensional phenomena. In this work, a thermal-hydraulic model of the Maine Yankee spent fuel pool using the TRACE code is developed. Such model has been used to perform a licensing calculation and the results obtained have been compared with experimental measurements made at the pool, showing a good agreement between the calculations predicted by TRACE and the experimental data. (authors)