Announcements
- This offering of the course is now over.
- Some files are password protected because of copyright issues. Students will be given the password in class.
- Lectures for the 2003/4 academic year took place on March 19, 20, 21 and April 23, 24, 25, 2004. The final exam took place on May 2, 2004.
- Lectures and the exam were at the Skills Training Centre, 1610 Champlain Avenue, Whitby, Ontario. See Durham College map and driving directions. The Skills Training Centre is identified as (3) on the map.
- Lectures took place in room 1-10 for all sessions except for April 23 when the room will be 1-9. See building layout (pdf 198kb).
- Sessions details are given below.
- Some photos of the 2004 session.
Course description:
The thermal-hydraulic design part of the course includes the primary heat transport system design of nuclear reactors, emphasizing reactor main components and characteristics. Review of design methods and system equations based on conservation of heat, momentum and mass, including adequate empirical design correlations, and critical heat flux and pressure drop calculation methods. Topics include: description of reactor components and systems, design methodology, plant performance, safety design margins, etc. The thermal-hydraulics analysis part of the course includes two-fluid two-phase modelling of thermalhydraulics phenomena in reactor heat transport system including modelling and simulation of postulated accidents. Topics include: two-fluid conservation equations and constitutive correlations, nodalization schemes and numerical methods applied in thermalhydraulic network simulation, equation of state and the rate method, computer code development, CATHENA computer code specific theory, numerical algorithm, and flow regime modelling.
Format: Nominally, two modules consisting of all day sessions for about 3 days each, separated by about one month.
Prerequisite: Registration in the UNENE Master's degree program or its equivalent.
Instructors:
- Nik Popov, course leader, AECL Sheridan Park, Adjunct Professor, McMaster University, 905-823-9060, ext. 3623.
- Laurence Leung, AECL Chalk River, 613-584-8811 ext. 4813
- Bill Garland, Professor, McMaster University, 905-525-9140 ext. 24925
Preparing for the course:
- If you were a regular senior undergraduate or graduate student in Engineering at McMaster, then no special preparation would be necessary for taking this course. Any accredited undergraduate engineering program contains sufficient mathematics and physics for this course. The content needed is all in the course notes. It should not be necessary to look elsewhere for special background information. So relax on that point.
- However, there is a fair bit of mathematics (first and second order ordinary and partial differential equations) and some simple numerical methods to contend with.. If it has been a while since you have been in university and your mathematics has become a bit foggy, then you might want to first look over the course notes on this site to get a feel for what deficiencies you might have and then to dig out your old university texts to brush up. But don't panic, exotic mathematical manipulations and solutions are not expected; rather, the differenctial equations are used to express heat and mass flow balancesand provide simple, approximate solutions.
- Please do read ahead using the course notes supplied below. The compressed format does not give much time to think during the sessions but you can compensate somewhat by reading ahead.
- You will need to print off the notes given below so you can follow along in the lectures.
Course Administration:
Course Notes
- 1. Course introduction - 1 hour, Nik Popov
- 2. Design Requirements - 2 hours , Nik Popov
- 3. Power Reactor Types and Designs - 1 hour, Nik Popov
- 4. Process Design Evolution - 1 hour, Nik Popov
- 5. Heat Transport System Thermalhydraulics - 3 hours, Bill Garland
- 6. Flow Instabilities - 2 hours, Nik Popov
- 7. Fuel-coolant heat transfer - 3 hours, Bill Garland
- 8. Reactor Thermodynamics - 4 hours, Laurence Leung / Nik Popov
- 9. Two-Phase Flow Fundamentals and impact on the design process - 2 hours, Laurence Leung
- 10. Critical Heat Flux
- 11. Post Dryout Heat Transfer
- 12. Pressure Drop
- 13.. Explanations for assignments - 1 hour, Popov
- Total for Module 1 = 24 hours, 8 hours per day
- 14. Review of Module 1 assignments and student presentations - 3 hours, Popov
- 15. Basic equations for Thermalhydraulic Analysis - 2 hours, Popov
- 16. Equation of State - 2 hours, Garland
- 17. Nodalization - 2 hours, Garland
- 18. The Rate Form of Equation of State - 2 hours, Garland
- 19. Review of computer programs - 2 hours, Popov
- 20. Thermalhydraulic network calculations - 1 hour, Popov
- 21. CATHENA t-h models - 4 hours, Popov
- 22. Preparation for Final Text - 1 hour, Popov
- 23. Final Test - 3 hours, Popov
- Total Week 2 - 24 hours, 8 hours per day
- Supplementary Material
- References (pdf 4kb)
- References (pdf 48kb)
Assignments and Tests
- 2004
- 2003
- 2002 summer session
- 2002 fall session
- 2001
- 2000
- Test 1 for EP718 (pdf 23kb) new as of 2004.03.21
- Test 2 for EP718 (pdf 14kb) new as of 2004.03.21
Interesting and Informative Links
- Teaching matters - helpful general information on teaching and learning for the student and the educator
- Suggestions welcome
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