A Numerical Simulation of Swirling Two-Phase Flow in BWR Steam-Water Separator and Its Optimization

An advanced numerical method based on the two-fluid model has been developed. The solution method presented here is an extension of the SIMPLEST scheme, a fully implicit scheme for single-phase flow analysis. It is robust and unconditionally stable, and therefore it enables us to use a very large time step size. This feature is suitable for steady and/or slow transient flow analyses. Furthermore, it enhances numerical stability during rapid transient calculations. By using this method, swirling gas-liquid flow in a steam-water separator of Boiling Water Reactors (BWRs) was calculated and the hydrodynamics characteristics were investigated for optimization.