A methodology to quantify effects of constitutive equations on safety analysis using integral effect test data

Abstract

To improve the predictive capability of a nuclear thermal hydraulic safety analysis code by developing a better constitutive equation for individual phenomenon has been the general research direction until now. This paper proposes a new method to directly use complex experimental data obtained from integral effect test (IET) to improve constitutive models holistically and simultaneously. The method relies on the sensitivity of a simulation result of IET data to the multiple constitutive equations utilized during the simulation, and the sensitivity of individual model determines the direction of modification for the constitutive model. To develop a robust and generalized method, a clustering algorithm using an artificial neural network, sample space size determination using non-parametric statistics, and sampling method of Latin hypercube sampling are used in a combined manner. The value of the proposed methodology is demonstrated by applying the method to the ATLAS DSP-05 IET experiment. A sensitivity of each observation parameter to the constitutive models is analyzed. The new methodology suggested in the study can be used to improve the code prediction results of complex IET data by identifying the direction for constitutive equations to be modified.