FUELBASE, TAF-ID Databases and OC Software: Advanced Computational Tools to Perform Thermodynamic Calculations on Nuclear Fuel Materials

Abstract : In case of a severe accident, the phase equilibria and thermodynamic properties of the corium which designates the complex mixture formed by chemical interaction at high temperature between different fuel and structural materials in the reactor have to be predicted. CALPHAD is a suitable method to develop a thermodynamic database to investigate such complex materials containing a large number of elements. New advanced computational tools will be presented in this work: (i) the Open Calphad Software (www.opencalphad.com) developed by B. Sundman, which is an open source code to perform thermodynamic calculations by Gibbs energy minimization; (ii) the FUELBASE database, developed at the CEA since 2005, which allows calculations on complex corium compositions to be performed; and (iii) the TAF-ID (Thermodynamics of Advanced Fuels – International Database) database, which is an OECD/NEA project (www.oecd-nea.org/science/taf-id) launched in 2013 to develop a thermodynamic database on nuclear fuel materials in the framework of an international collaboration between Canada, France, Japan, the Netherlands, Korea and the United States of America.