MSc Nuclear Science and Technology / Course details

This course unit offers an introduction to nuclear severe accidents for light water reactors. The course begins by introducing basic safety principles and the history of severe accidents before providing a grounding in thermal-hydraulics and thermodynamics that will be relevant to understanding severe accident phenomenology. The physics and chemistry of a typical severe accident transient is then covered in detail following a chronological order, which extends from a core uncovery event, clad oxidation, core melt down to the breach of the Reactor Pressure Vessel. Ex-vessel severe accident phenomena are also covered in the course, which extends to environmental consequences. The course unit will also include an overview of some of the tools and codes available and widely used within the nuclear sector and will enable the student to join industry with a solid background in severe accident phenomenology and safety approach. 

The unit aims to:

•    Contextualise severe accidents in the basic principles of a safety case and provide a history of how the field developed from the early Chicago Pile experiments.  

•    Establish a grounding in aspects of thermal-hydraulics, thermodynamics and material science that are relevant to severe accidents.

•    Introduce the fields of fission product release mechanics, chemistry and aerosol physics.

•    Provide an overview of the environmental consequences of a nuclear severe accident.

•    Introduce some of the methods used in industrial analyses of severe accident transients.

•    Provide an appreciation of the inherent uncertainties of a severe accident. 

ILO 1

Describe and explain the physics and chemistry phenomena that are expected to occur in the nuclear power plant if sustainable cooling of the core cannot be re-established.

ILO 2

Assess the positive and negative aspects of some severe accident phenomena in terms of the different risks outcomes.

ILO 3

Solve practical problems through calculation and / or deduction in order to estimate or bound plant responses or consequences.

ILO 4

Interpret phase diagrams in order to provide insight into material behaviours in a degraded core environment.

ILO 5

Compare and contrast prospective severe accident outcomes through an understanding of the phenomenology and apply deduction based on different initial conditions.

A. Knowledge and Understanding 
Students are taught via directed reading (pre-course) and directly in appropriately equipped rooms at the institution delivering the module. Learning is consolidated in tutorial and review sessions.

•    Pre-course directed reading                            
•    Direct Teaching
•    Tutorial sessions

B. Intellectual Skills
Students are able to exercise their intellectual skills through in-class discussion, tutorial sessions, and the completion of the assigned post-module criticality safety assessment.

•    In-class discussion
•    Post-course assignment

C. Practical Skills
Students are able to exercise their practical skills through tutorial sessions and completion of the assigned post-module criticality safety assessment.

•    Tutorial sessions
•    Post-course assignment

D. Transferable Skills and Personal Qualities
Students are able to enhance their transferable skills through in-class discussion, tutorial sessions, and the completion of the assigned post-module criticality safety assessment.

•    In-class discussion
•    Tutorial sessions
•    Assignment exercise
•    Post-course assignment

Feedback provided on strong, weak or missing aspects of the assignment. Score provided for examination.

The principal text for the course is “Nuclear Safety in Light Water Reactors”, Bal Raj Seghal.

This course is designed to be self-contained, but the student may benefit from some background reading. The content of any pre-course reading that also appears in the lecture series can be assessed.

Texts that are intended to provide background support for the study of severe accidents but not directly related to the field are as follows:  

Thermal Physics: C.B.P Finn, A. Rex (3rd Edition).

Fundamentals of Heat and Mass Transfer (6th Edition), De Witt et al.

Material Science and Engineering (10th Edition), W. Callister & G Rethwisch.