ASTEC, le Code Européen d’Evaluation du Terme Source: Etat d’Avancement et Applications, y Compris aux Réacteurs CANDU

J.P. Van Dorsselaere¹, P. Giordano¹, M.P. Kissane¹, B. Schwinges², S.Ganju³, L. Dickson⁴. Sixième conférence internationale sur les méthodes de simulation en génie nucléaire Société Nucléaire Canadienne, Montréal, Québec, oct. 2004.

Research on light-water reactor severe accidents (SA) is still required in a limited number of areas in order to confirm accident-management plans. Thus, 49 European organizations have linked their SA research in a durable way through SARNET (Severe Accident Research and management NETwork), part of the European 6th Framework Programme. One goal of SARNET is to consolidate the integral code ASTEC (Accident Source Term Evaluation Code, developed by IRSN and GRS) as the European reference tool for safety studies; SARNET efforts include extending the application scope to reactor types other than PWR (including VVER) such as BWR and CANDU. ASTEC is used in IRSN’s Probabilistic Safety Analysis level 2 of 900 MWe French PWRs. An earlier version of ASTEC’s SOPHAEROS module, including improvements by AECL, is being validated as the Canadian Industry Standard Toolset code for FP-transport analysis in the CANDU Heat Transport System. Work with ASTEC has also been performed by Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, Mumbai, on IPHWR containment thermal hydraulics.

(1) IRSN
(2) GRS
(3) BARC
(4) AECL