Thermal hydraulic design and analysis of updated CFETR water cooled ceramic breeder blanket

Abstract The Water Cooled Ceramic Breeder (WCCB) blanket is one of the candidates for Chinese Fusion Engineering Test Reactor (CFETR). In the engineering design stage of CFETR, an updated design of WCCB blanket was proposed corresponding to the latest core parameters (major radius=7.2 m, minus radius=2.2 m). The design aims at covering the CFETR multiple fusion powers (including 200 MW, 500 MW, 1 GW and 1.5 GW) while satisfying the tritium self-sufficiency. To develop the thermal-hydraulic design of the WCCB blanket, thermal-hydraulic analyses were carried out following a theoretical-computational approach based on the finite volume method and adopting the CFD-code Fluent. The results show the inlet/outlet temperatures of cooling channels are in good agreement with the PWR conditions (285℃ inlet temperature, 325℃ outlet temperature). The temperatures of blanket components are below the allowable temperature of the corresponding material (pebble bed-900℃, structural component-500℃). The feasibility of the thermal hydraulic design of the updated blanket was verified.