TY - GEN
T1 - Extension of xenon oscillations safety margins using weakly nonlinear stability analysis
AU - Kastin, Nir
AU - Meron, Ehud
AU - Kolin, Assaf
AU - Kinast, Shai
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© The Authors, published by EDP Sciences. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
PY - 2020/1/1
Y1 - 2020/1/1
N2 - Weakly nonlinear stability analysis is applied to study xenon oscillations in nuclear reactors using the approach of multiple time-scales method. This approach allows to characterize the dynamics of the system beyond the Hopf instability point. It provides important insight on the characteristics of the oscillations, namely if they diverge with time, or converge into a bounded limit cycle. Detailed derivation of the amplitude equation is presented. This equation is used to identify parameter ranges of bounded periodic oscillations, which may be allowed for safe operation. The influence of neutron generation time and the power feedback coefficients on the amplitude of limit cycles, as well as on convergence times, is discussed. The described method may be used to extend the safety margins required to prevent xenon unstable oscillations in reactor cores.
AB - Weakly nonlinear stability analysis is applied to study xenon oscillations in nuclear reactors using the approach of multiple time-scales method. This approach allows to characterize the dynamics of the system beyond the Hopf instability point. It provides important insight on the characteristics of the oscillations, namely if they diverge with time, or converge into a bounded limit cycle. Detailed derivation of the amplitude equation is presented. This equation is used to identify parameter ranges of bounded periodic oscillations, which may be allowed for safe operation. The influence of neutron generation time and the power feedback coefficients on the amplitude of limit cycles, as well as on convergence times, is discussed. The described method may be used to extend the safety margins required to prevent xenon unstable oscillations in reactor cores.
KW - Hopf bifurcation
KW - Multiple time scales
KW - Xenon oscillations
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85108437850&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1051/epjconf/202124711004
DO - 10.1051/epjconf/202124711004
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:85108437850
T3 - International Conference on Physics of Reactors: Transition to a Scalable Nuclear Future, PHYSOR 2020
SP - 2270
EP - 2277
BT - International Conference on Physics of Reactors
A2 - Margulis, Marat
A2 - Blaise, Partrick
PB - EDP Sciences - Web of Conferences
T2 - 2020 International Conference on Physics of Reactors: Transition to a Scalable Nuclear Future, PHYSOR 2020
Y2 - 28 March 2020 through 2 April 2020
ER -