Direct ECC Bypass Phenomena During LBLOCA Reflood Phase Observed in the MIDAS Test Facility

One of the advanced design features of the APR-1400, direct vessel injection (DVI) system is being considered instead of conventional cold leg injection (CLI) system. It is known that the DVI system greatly enhances the reliability of the emergency core cooling (ECC) system. However, there is still a dispute on its performance in terms of water delivery to the reactor core during the reflood phase of a large-break loss-of-coolant accident (LOCA). Thus, experimental validation is in progress. In this paper, test results of a direct ECC bypass performed in the steam-water test facility called MIDAS (Multi-dimensional Investigation in Downcomer Annulus Simulation) is presented. The test condition is determined, based on the preliminary analysis of TRAC code, by applying the ‘modified linear scaling method’ with the 1/4.93 length scale. From the tests, ECC direct bypass fraction, steam condensation rate and information on the flow distribution in the upper annulus downcomer region is obtained.