Investigation on turbulent heat transfer to lead–bismuth eutectic flows in circular tubes for nuclear applications

Since many years, the Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe has been working on the research and development of an accelerator driven sub-critical system (ADS) cooled by lead–bismuth eutectic (LBE). Although various numerical tools for thermal hydraulics have been established at the Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe, reliably validated physical models related to turbulent heat transfer in LBE flows are still missing. Especially, physical models on heat transfer and turbulent Prandtl number have to be re-evaluated in LBE conditions to improve the reliability of numerical tools. In the present paper, review and assessment of the existing physical models are made. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis is carried out for circular tube geometries. Based on the assessment of the existing models and the CFD results achieved, recommendations are made on correlations of heat transfer and turbulent Prandtl number for numerical applications to LBE flows.