Publications related to Graphite-moderated reactor

Experimental study and interpretative modelling of the Power Exhaust in Configurations with Multiple X-Points in TCV

Nuclear fusion presents a promising clean energy source to mitigate future energy crises, with magnetic confinement fusion well-positioned to provide a baseload scenario to power future reactors. The unmitigated power exhaust of such reactors threatens its ...

EPFL2024

Quantitative Design of a New e-Methanol Production Process

Alfred Rufer

In the context of the need to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions from personal transportation, a new process for the production of e-methanol is presented. It is a CO2 hydrogenation process, powered mainly by renewable energy sources such as pho ...

MDPI2022

Thermodynamic modelling of hydrogen production in sorbent-enhanced biochar-direct chemical looping process

Hydrogen (H-2) has been widely considered the clean energy carrier of choice for emerging renewable energy generation technologies. However, H-2 is a secondary fuel mainly derived from natural gas. Over the past decades, research on developing H-2 producti ...

2022

Flexibilisation of Biogas-Based Power-to-Gas Processes: A Techno-Economic and Experimental Assessment

Andreas Gantenbein

Biogas-based power-to-X technology allows storing renewable electricity, while producing CO2-neutral products. This work investigates the conversion and upgrading of digestion-derived gas mixtures with focus on increasing the operational flexibility of the ...

EPFL2022

Improved methodology for analysis and design of Molten Salt Reactors

Rodrigo Gonzalez Gonzaga De Oliveira

Molten Salt Reactors is a class of advanced reactors that is typically characterised by the presence of a molten inorganic salt of a fissile material as fuel. At the moment, this class of reactors is considered one of the promising options in the long run ...

EPFL2021

Reaction pathways of methane abatement in Pd-Rh three-way catalyst in heavy duty applications: A combined approach based on exhaust analysis, model gas reactor and DRIFTS measurements

Oliver Kröcher, Davide Ferri, Moyu Wang

Methane abatement pathways in Pd/Rh three-way catalysts have been investigated in three scales ranging from a vehicle application size catalyst, a model gas reactor and the catalyst in powder form. A special test rig was designed for the investigation of v ...

ELSEVIER SCIENCE SA2021

A Hybrid Approach to Neutron Transport with Thermal-hydraulic Feedback for Reactor Transient Analysis

Alexander Aures

Understanding the time-dependent behaviour of a nuclear reactor following an intended or unintended change of the reactor conditions is of crucial importance to the safe operation of nuclear reactors. Safety evaluations of nuclear reactors involve the anal ...

EPFL2021

Analysis of the sorption-enhanced chemical looping biomass gasification process: Performance assessment and optimization through design of experiment approach

François Maréchal, Thanaphorn Detchusananard

In this study, the performance of high-purity hydrogen production through the sorption-enhanced chemical looping gasification (SECLG) process, involving a gasifier, calciner, and air reactor, was investigated. In this process, the biomass feedstock was woo ...

2020

Statistical Burnup Distribution of Moving Pebbles in the High-Temperature Reactor HTR-PM

Andreas Pautz, Jiri Krepel, Fanny Vitullo, Horst-Michael Prasser

In the pebble-bed high-temperature reactor under construction in China, called the HTR-PM, the spherical fuel elements continuously flow downward in the cylindrical core. The burnup of each pebble is checked at the core outlet and, according to the achieve ...

ASME2020

The EQL0D fuel cycle procedure and its application to the transition to equilibrium of selected molten salt reactor designs

Boris Aviv Hombourger, Andreas Pautz, Jiri Krepel

In recent years, Molten Salt Reactors (MSRs), one of the Generation IV concepts, have noticeably gained in interest. Several molten salt reactor types use fuel in liquid form, bringing various advantages, notably in terms of fuel cycle. However, simulating ...

PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD2020

Distributed forward stimulated Brillouin scattering measurement using broadband BOTDR

Luc Thévenaz, Simon Adrien Zaslawski, Zhisheng Yang, Sheng Wang

Brillouin optical time-domain reflectometry is used to perform distributed forward stimulated Brillouin scattering (FSBS) measurements. This configuration suppresses the need for an additional frequency scanning to evaluate the local Brillouin peak gain wh ...

SPIE2019

Impact of the volume heat source on the RANS-based CFD analysis of Molten Salt Reactors

Carlo Fiorina

Several efforts have been spent in recent years to address the simulation challenges posed by the non-conventional design of Molten Salt Reactors (MSRs). One of the design specificities of MSRs is the volume heat source in the liquid fuel, which has been p ...

PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD2019

Dynamic Optimization of Reaction Systems via Exact Parsimonious Input Parameterization

Dominique Bonvin, Diogo Filipe Mateus Rodrigues

This paper discusses the use of parsimonious input parameterization for the dynamic optimization of reaction systems. This parameterization is able to represent the optimal inputs with only a few parameters. In the context of batch, semibatch, and continuo ...

AMER CHEMICAL SOC2019

Breed-and-burn fuel cycle in molten salt reactors

Andreas Pautz, Boris Aviv Hombourger, Jiri Krepel

The operation of a reactor on an open but self-sustainable cycle without actinide separation is known as breed-and-burn. It has mostly been envisioned for use in solid-fueled fast-spectrum reactors such as sodium-cooled fast reactors. In this paper the app ...

EDP Sciences2019

Improved Alkali Intercalation of Carbonaceous Materials in Ammonia Solution

László Forró, Bálint Náfrádi, Péter Szirmai, Ferenc Simon, Bence Gábor Márkus, Sándor Kollarics

Alkali-intercalated graphite compounds represent a compelling modification of carbon with significant application potential and various fundamentally important phases. The intercalation of graphite with alkali atoms (Li and K) using liquid ammonia solution ...

WILEY-V C H VERLAG GMBH2019

Effects of humid air on aerodynamic journal bearings

Jürg Alexander Schiffmann, Eliott Philippe Guenat

The development of aerodynamic bearings applications where ambient conditions cannot be controlled (e.g., for automotive fuel cell compressor) raises the question of the effects of condensation in the humid air on perfor-mance. A modified Reynolds equation ...

2018

Statistical Burnup Distribution Of Moving Pebbles In Htr-Pm Reactor

Andreas Pautz, Jiri Krepel, Fanny Vitullo, Horst-Michael Prasser

In the pebble-bed high temperature reactor under construction in China, called HTR-PM, the spherical fuel elements continuously flow downward in the cylindrical core. After the discharge, the burnup of each pebble is checked at the core outlet and, accordi ...

AMER SOC MECHANICAL ENGINEERS2018

Cfd-Based Correlation For Forced Convection Heat Transfer In Circular Ducts Of Internally Heated Molten Salts

Carlo Fiorina

Heat transfer phenomena involving internally heated fluid flows are of particular interest in several industrial applications, in chemical plants as in the nuclear field. This topic is relevant for the development of the Molten Salt Reactors (MSRs) since i ...

AMER SOC MECHANICAL ENGINEERS2018

Conceptual Design of a Sustainable Waste Burning Molten Salt Reactor

Boris Aviv Hombourger

For an energy source to qualify as sustainable, it must maximize the efficiency with which it uses natural resources while minimizing the amounts of waste it produces. Currently deployed nuclear power plants however use a very limited amount of the energy ...

EPFL2018

Effect of reactor material and its reuse on photo-Fenton process efficiency at near-neutral pH: Alterations in E-coli inactivation and resorcinol degradation kinetics in water

Stefanos Giannakis, Angelica Varon Lopez

The effect of reactor material (borosilicate and polyethylene terephthalate-PET) and its reuse on the microbiological and chemical decontamination of water by the photo-Fenton reaction at near-neutral pH was assessed. Escherichia coli was used as an indica ...

Elsevier2017