Publications

We present the design and implementation of InfoStar, an adaptive visual analytics platform for mobile devices such as PDAs, laptops, Tablet PCs and mobile phones, InfoStar extends the reach of visual analytics technology beyond the traditional desktop paradigm to provide ubiquitous access to interactive visualizations of information spaces. These visualizations are critical in addressing the knowledge needs of human agents operating in the field, in areas as diverse as business, homeland security, law enforcement, protective services, emergency medical services and scientific discovery. We describe an initial real world deployment of this technology, in which the InfoStar platform has been used to offer mobile access to scheduling and venue information to conference attendees at Supercomputing 2004. © 2005 IEEE.

The mission of the American Textile (AMTEX{trademark}) Partnership is to engage the unique technical resources of the Department of Energy National Laboratories to work with the US Integrated Textile Complex (US ITC) and research universities to develop and deploy technologies that will increase the competitiveness of the US ITC. The objectives of the Demand Activated Manufacturing Architecture (DAMA) project of AMTEX are: (1) to determine strategic business structure changes for the US ITC; (2) to establish a textile industry electronic marketplace, (3) to provide methods for US ITC education ad implementation of an electronic marketplace. The Enterprise Modeling and Simulation Task of DAMA is focusing on the first DAMA goal as described in another paper of this conference. The Cooperative Business Management (CBM) Task of DAMA is developing computer-based tools that will render system-wide information accessible for improved decision making. Three CBM strategies and the associated computer tools being developed to support their implementation are described in this paper. This effort is addressing the second DAMA goal to establish a textile industry electronic marketplace in concert with the Connectivity and Infrastructure Task of DAMA. As the CBM tools mature, they will be commercialized through the DAMA Education, Outreach and Commercialization Task of DAMA to achieve the third and final DAMA goal.

The potential exists in a nuclear reactor core melt severe accident for molten core debris to be dispersed under high pressure into the containment building. If this occurs, the set of phenomena that result in the transfer of energy to the containment atmosphere and its surroundings is referred to as direct containment heating (DCH). Because of the potential for DCH to lead to early containment failure, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (USNRC) has sponsored an extensive research program consisting of experimental, analytical, and risk integration components. An important element of the analytical research has been the development and assessment of direct containment heating models in the CONTAIN code. This report documents the DCH models in the CONTAIN code. DCH models in CONTAIN for representing debris transport, trapping, chemical reactions, and heat transfer from debris to the containment atmosphere and surroundings are described. The descriptions include the governing equations and input instructions in CONTAIN unique to performing DCH calculations. Modifications made to the combustion models in CONTAIN for representing the combustion of DCH-produced and pre-existing hydrogen under DCH conditions are also described. Input table options for representing the discharge of debris from the RPV and the entrainment phase of the DCH process are also described. A sample calculation is presented to demonstrate the functionality of the models. The results show that reasonable behavior is obtained when the models are used to predict the sixth Zion geometry integral effects test at 1/10th scale.

In previous years, a suite of interim models had been developed for the CONTAIN code for analyzing direct containment heating (DCH) accidents. The initial development and application of these DCH models are described in a previous WRS paper. While useful, these interim models were incomplete and were highly parametric. The parametric nature of the interim CONTAIN DCH models was necessary at the time because of the lack of relevant DCH experimental data, and to facilitate sensitivity studies aimed at improving our understanding of the most important governing processes in a DCH event. However, today our understanding of DCH phenomenology is significantly improved from when the interim DCH models were developed. This understanding largely stems from recently completed NRC-sponsored DCH experiments at Sandia National Laboratories and Argonne National Laboratory. New models have been developed and added to the CONTAIN code for modeling DCH events to reflect this improvement in our understanding of DCH. The purpose of this paper is to describe the new DCH models in CONTAIN. A demonstration of the new models by comparing simplified calculations against relevant DCH test data will also be presented in this paper. This paper is an extension of the preliminary descriptions of the DCH model improvements presented in the 19th WRS paper. The new models that have been added to CONTAIN for analyzing DCH are briefly discussed below. The following paragraphs also include brief discussions of the motivation and/or basis for the developed improvement. The models are described in greater detail in the full paper.

The CONTAIN code is currently being used to predict containment thermal hydraulic conditions during design basis and severe accidents for advanced light water reactor (ALWR) designs such as the Westinghouse AP600. In the AP600 design, a passive containment cooling system (PCCS) is used for reducing long-term overpressure during accidents. CONTAIN models for heat and mass transfer within the AP600 containment and outer air cooling channel are verified by comparing recent CONTAIN calculations to integral test data obtained by Westinghouse in their PCCS Integral Test Facility. The comparison includes test in which the outer containment wall is both dry and wet, that is, the wet tests involve an evaporative water film that enhances heat transfer as will be the case for AP600. The appropriateness of the heat and mass transfer analogy methodology used in the CONTAIN code is demonstrated. Code model limitations are discussed along with model development plans and applications for AP600.

Two revisions of the CONTAIN code, CONTAIN 1.11 and 1.12 , have recently been released. The purpose of this paper is to highlight the new features of these revisions and to discuss other new code features currently under development. The features of CONTAIN 1.11 discussed here include a quasi-mechanistic concrete outgassing model, the connected structure option for heat conduction between compartments, and a new approach for modeling forced convective heat transfer. The direct containment heating (DCH) models released as part of CONTAIN 1.12 are also discussed. New code features currently under development include a revised gas combustion model and a new multifield DCH model. New features of the revised combustion model include the treatment of spontaneous recombination and diffusion flames. CONTAIN plant calculations comparing the old and the revised combustion models are presented. The new features of the multifield DCH model are discussed, and demonstration calculations using this model to analyze a small scale experiment are presented.

This report describes the phenomenological equations and the numerical procedures used by the CONTAIN 1.1 code to determine the conditions within nuclear power plant containment during a severe accident. The CONTAIN detailed models provide the capability to mechanistically calculate the containment internal thermalhydraulic conditions and the amount of radioactive matter that would be released to the environment if there were a leak from the containment. Note that the CONTAIN models can be verified by comparing the code calculations to experimental results. The models described include those to account for the flows of mass and energy between containment compartments, the exchange of energy between the atmosphere and heat structures, the thermodynamic conditions, the distributions of aerosols, the decay and transport of fission products, the deflagration of hydrogen and carbon monoxide, boiling water reactor suppression pool behavior, and engineering safety features, including a spray, fan coolers, and an ice condenser. These models are solved with implicit coupling, where appropriate, to obtain a stable and computationally efficient solution. 52 refs., 36 figs., 9 tabs.