Heat transfer performance test of PDHRS heat exchangers of PGSFR using STELLA-1 facility

The STELLA-1 facility was designed and constructed to carry out separate effect tests of the decay heat exchanger (DHX) and natural draft sodium-to-air heat exchanger (AHX), which are key components of the safety-grade decay heat removal system in PGSFR. The DHX is a sodium-to-sodium heat exchanger with a straight tube arrangement, and the AHX is a sodium-to-air heat exchanger with a helically coiled tube arrangement. The model heat exchangers in STELLA-1 have been designed to meet their own similitude conditions from the prototype ones, of which scale ratios were set to be unity in height (or length) and 1/2.5 in heat transfer rate. Consequently, the overall heat transfer coefficients and log-mean temperature differences of the prototypes have been preserved as well. The steady-state test results for each model heat exchanger obtained from STELLA-1 showed good agreement with the theoretical results of the computer design codes for thermal-sizing and a performance analysis of the DHX and AHX. In the DHX result comparison, the discrepancies in the heat transfer rate ranged from −4.4% to 2.0%, and in the AHX result comparison, they ranged from −11.1% to 12.6%. Therefore, the first step in thermal design codes validation for sodium heat exchangers, e.g., DHX and AHX, has been successfully completed with the experimental database obtained from STELLA-1. In addition, the heat transfer performance of the DHX and AHX was found to be satisfactory enough to secure a reliable decay heat removal performance.