Numerical Analysis of Natural Convection Induced Oxygen Transport in Liquid Lead Bismuth Eutectic

Authors

Xianfang Tan, University of Nevada, Las VegasFollow
Yitung Chen, University of Nevada, Las VegasFollow
Huajun Chen, University of Nevada, Las VegasFollow
Taide Tan, University of Nevada, Las VegasFollow
Hsuan-Tsung Hsieh, University of Nevada, Las VegasFollow

Document Type

Conference Proceeding

Publication Date

11-5-2006

Publication Title

2006 ASME International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition

Publisher

American Society of Mechanical Engineers

First page number:

1

Last page number:

8

Abstract

Liquid lead bismuth eutectic (LBE) is very corrosive to steels. To mitigate structural corrosion of LBE systems, active oxygen control technique is developed. To enhance the speed of oxygen transport in liquid LBE, natural convection has been proposed. This paper numerically analyzes the oxygen transport in a natural convection induced LBE enclosure. Different temperature boundary conditions are added to the container. Both laminar and turbulent LBE flows which are distinguished by strength of flow measured are analyzed. Three laminar cases: (a) heated from the bottom and cooled from the top of the container; (b) heated from the sidewalls and cooled from the top of the container; (c) one sidewall heated and the opposite wall cooled, and one fully turbulent case with one sidewall heated and the opposite sidewall cooled are chosen. Oxidization in near wall areas and formation of oxide layers on container surfaces are considered. In each case, the characteristic velocity and oxygen diffusion time are estimated, the change of oxygen distribution with time are obtained, and the bulk concentration of oxygen and the efficiency of oxide layer formation on different liquid-solid interfaces are calculated. To obtain more information of oxygen transportation and distribution, three-dimension analysis of the laminar flow is done. Based on the analysis, several conclusions are finally obtained.

Keywords

Active oxygen; Control systems; Corrosion and anti-corrosives; Eutectics; Heat – Convection; Natural; Laminar flow; Lead Bismuth; Natural convection; Numerical analysis; Oxidation; Oxygen; Steel alloys; Turbulence

Disciplines

Acoustics, Dynamics, and Controls | Fluid Dynamics | Materials Science and Engineering | Mechanical Engineering | Nuclear Engineering

Language

English

Comments

Conference held: Chicago, Illinois, USA, November 5 – 10, 2006

Permissions

Use Find in Your Library, contact the author, or interlibrary loan to garner a copy of the item. Publisher policy does not allow archiving the final published version. If a post-print (author's peer-reviewed manuscript) is allowed and available, or publisher policy changes, the item will be deposited.

Repository Citation

Tan, X., Chen, Y., Chen, H., Tan, T., Hsieh, H. (2006). Numerical Analysis of Natural Convection Induced Oxygen Transport in Liquid Lead Bismuth Eutectic. 2006 ASME International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition 1-8. American Society of Mechanical Engineers.