Pressure drop evaluation based on two-phase flow observation in packed bed system

Abstract

Two-phase pressure drop in the debris has been studied by many researchers concerning the debris cooling characteristics during a severe accident in a nuclear reactor. However, its flow regime transition of the two-phase flow in the debris has not been well understood, which strongly affects the interfacial drag and the pressure drop. Conventional models for gas-liquid two-phase flow pressure drop have not been established to evaluate interfacial drag accurately. In this study, high-speed imaging of a two-dimensional network model was performed to clarify the effect of flow patterns on interfacial drag and pressure drop. Usually, it would not be easy to visualize such two-phase flow behavior in a randomly packed bed due to the reflection/refraction of light and/or overlapping bubbles, even if the test section is made of transparent materials. Therefore, in this study, a test section, which simulates a two-dimensional network of porous structures, was fabricated to avoid overlapping bubbles. The two-phase flow pattern in the porous structure has been identified by high-speed imaging of the two-dimensional network model. The flow regime map based on the flow pattern visualization results is applied to the pressure drop evaluation and it could reduce the overestimation of experimental values. The experimental results suggested that the interfacial drag term should be modified in the gas-liquid two-phase flow pressure drop model.