Aïmen E. Gheribi

Prediction of the thermophysical properties of molten salt fast reactor fuel from first-principles

Molten fluorides are known to show favourable thermophysical properties which make them good candidate coolants for nuclear fission reactors. Here we investigate the special case of mixtures of lithium fluoride and thorium fluoride, which act both as coolant and as fuel in the molten salt fast reactor concept. By using ab initio parameterised polarisable force fields, we show that it is possible to calculate the whole set of properties (density, thermal expansion, heat capacity, viscosity and thermal conductivity) which are necessary for assessing the heat transfer performance of the melt over the whole range of compositions and temperatures. We then deduce from our calculations several figures of merit which are important in helping the optimisation of the design of molten salt fast reactors.

Process Simulation and Control Optimization of a Blast Furnace Using Classical Thermodynamics Combined to a Direct Search Algorithm

Several numerical approaches have been proposed in the literature to simulate the behavior of modern blast furnaces: finite volume methods, data-mining models, heat and mass balance models, and classical thermodynamic simulations. Despite this, there is actually no efficient method for evaluating quickly optimal operating parameters of a blast furnace as a function of the iron ore composition, which takes into account all potential chemical reactions that could occur in the system. In the current study, we propose a global simulation strategy of a blast furnace, the 5-unit process simulation. It is based on classical thermodynamic calculations coupled to a direct search algorithm to optimize process parameters. These parameters include the minimum required metallurgical coke consumption as well as the optimal blast chemical composition and the total charge that simultaneously satisfy the overall heat and mass balances of the system. Moreover, a Gibbs free energy function for metallurgical coke is parameterized in the current study and used to fine-tune the simulation of the blast furnace. Optimal operating conditions and predicted output stream properties calculated by the proposed thermodynamic simulation strategy are compared with reference data found in the literature and have proven the validity and high precision of this simulation.

Evidence of second order transition induced by the porosity in the thermal conductivity of sintered metals

In this paper, using both experimental data and theoretical modelling, we investigate the degradation of the thermal conductivity of sintered metals due simultaneously to the grain boundary thermal resistance and the porosity. We show that the porosity dependence of the thermal conductivity of sintered material from spherical particle powder, exhibits a critical behaviour associated with a second order phase transition. An analytical model with a single parameter is proposed to describe the critical behaviour of the thermal conductivity of sintered metals versus porosity.

Experimental study of the thermal conductivity of sintered tungsten: Evidence of a critical behaviour with porosity

Rear face flash experiments were performed in order to determine the thermal conductivity of sintered tungsten at room temperature. Ten different samples were synthesized with the spark plasma sintering technique. The microstructure obtained from the sintering is porous and consists of angular grains with medium sphericity. The average grain size (d) and the porosity (P) of the samples lie within the ranges of 2 mu m <= d <= 7 mu m and 0 <= P <= 0.35. We show that the dependence of the thermal conductivity of the sintered tungsten samples on the porosity shows a critical behaviour. A theoretical explanation of this behaviour and a predictive model for this porosity dependence are proposed

Thermal transport properties of halide solid solutions: Experiments vs equilibrium molecular dynamics

The composition dependence of thermal transport properties of the (Na,K)Cl rocksalt solid solution is investigated through equilibrium molecular dynamics (EMD) simulations in the entire range of composition and the results are compared with experiments published in recent work [Gheribi et al., J. Chem. phys. 141, 104508 (2014)]. The thermal diffusivity of the (Na,K)Cl solid solution has been measured from 473 K to 823 K using the laser flash technique, and the thermal conductivity was deduced from critically assessed data of heat capacity and density. The thermal conductivity was also predicted at 900 K in the entire range of composition by a series of EMD simulations in both NPT and NVT statistical ensembles using the Green-Kubo theory. The aim of the present paper is to provide an objective analysis of the capability of EMD simulations in predicting the composition dependence of the thermal transport properties of halide solid solutions. According to the Klemens-Callaway [P. G. Klemens, Phys. Rev. 119, 507 (1960) and J. Callaway and H. C. von Bayer, Phys. Rev. 120, 1149 (1960)] theory, the thermal conductivity degradation of the solid solution is explained by mass and strain field fluctuations upon the phonon scattering cross section. A rigorous analysis of the consistency between the theoretical approach and the EMD simulations is discussed in detail.

Thermal conductivity of halide solid solutions: measurement and prediction.

The composition dependence of the lattice thermal conductivity in NaCl-KCl solid solutions has been measured as a function of composition and temperature. Samples with systematically varied compositions were prepared and the laser flash technique was used to determine the thermal diffusivity from 373 K to 823 K. A theoretical model, based on the Debye approximation of phonon density of state (which contains no adjustable parameters) was used to predict the thermal conductivity of both stoichiometric compounds and fully disordered solid solutions. The predictions obtained with the model agree very well with our measurement. A general method for predicting the thermal conductivity of different halide systems is discussed.

Accurate determination of the Gibbs energy of Cu–Zr melts using the thermodynamic integration method in Monte Carlo simulations

The design of multicomponent alloys used in different applications based on specific thermo-physical properties determined experimentally or predicted from theoretical calculations is of major importance in many engineering applications. A procedure based on Monte Carlo simulations (MCS) and the thermodynamic integration (TI) method to improve the quality of the predicted thermodynamic properties calculated from classical thermodynamic calculations is presented in this study. The Gibbs energy function of the liquid phase of the Cu-Zr system at 1800 K has been determined based on this approach. The internal structure of Cu-Zr melts and amorphous alloys at different temperatures, as well as other physical properties were also obtained from MCS in which the phase trajectory was modeled by the modified embedded atom model formalism. A rigorous comparison between available experimental data and simulated thermo-physical properties obtained from our MCS is presented in this work. The modified quasichemical model in the pair approximation was parameterized using the internal structure data obtained from our MCS and the precise Gibbs energy function calculated at 1800 K from the TI method. The predicted activity of copper in Cu-Zr melts at 1499 K obtained from our thermodynamic optimization was corroborated by experimental data found in the literature. The validity of the amplitude of the entropy of mixing obtained from the in silico procedure presented in this work was analyzed based on the thermodynamic description of hard sphere mixtures.

Thermal conductivity of molten salt mixtures: Theoretical model supported by equilibrium molecular dynamics simulations

A theoretical model for the description of thermal conductivity of molten salt mixtures as a function of composition and temperature is presented. The model is derived by considering the classical kinetic theory and requires, for its parametrization, only information on thermal conductivity of pure compounds. In this sense, the model is predictive. For most molten salt mixtures, no experimental data on thermal conductivity are available in the literature. This is a hindrance for many industrial applications (in particular for thermal energy storage technologies) as well as an obvious barrier for the validation of the theoretical model. To alleviate this lack of data, a series of equilibrium molecular dynamics (EMD) simulations has been performed on several molten chloride systems in order to determine their thermal conductivity in the entire range of composition at two different temperatures: 1200 K and 1300 K. The EMD simulations are first principles type, as the potentials used to describe the interactions have been parametrized on the basis of first principle electronic structure calculations. In addition to the molten chlorides system, the model predictions are also compared to a recent similar EMD study on molten fluorides and with the few reliable experimental data available in the literature. The accuracy of the proposed model is within the reported numerical and/or experimental errors.

On the determination of the glass forming ability of AlxZr1−x alloys using molecular dynamics, Monte Carlo simulations, and classical thermodynamics

In this work, the glass forming ability of Al-Zr alloys is quantified using Monte Carlo (MC) and molecular dynamic (MD) simulations as well as classical thermodynamic calculations. The total energy of each studied structure of the Al-Zr system is described using the modified embedded atom model in the second-nearest-neighbour formalism. The parameterized Al-Zr cross potential which has been extensively validated using available experimental and ab initio data for several solid structures and for the liquid phase is used to evaluate thermodynamic, structural, and physical properties of the glass state and of the fully disordered (FD) face-centered cubic (FCC) solid solution with no short range order (SRO). The local environment of the Al-Zr amorphous phase is identified to be similar to that of a FCC solid structure with short range chemical order. A new approach to model the Gibbs energy of the amorphous phase based on the cluster variation method in the tetrahedron approximation is presented. The Gibbs e...

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