IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON APPLIED SUPERCONDUCTIVITY, VOL. 22, NO.

3, JUNE 2012 4704004

Dynamic Simulation of Sub-Scale ITER CS/STR

Cooling Loop
R. Maekawa, K. Oba, S. Takami, A. Iwamoto, H. S. Chang, A. Forgeas, L. Serio, R. Vallocorba, B. Rousset,
C. Hoa, and L. Monteiro

Abstract—The dynamic simulation of a sub-scale ITER Central

Solenoid (CS)/STRucture (STR) cooling loop has been performed
to investigate the cryogenic control strategies against pulsating
heat loads. HELIOS facility has been modified for this particular
study, which consists of a Liquid Helium (LHe) reservoir with two
immersed heat exchangers, a circulation pump and an approx-
imately 130 m long piping with three evenly distributed heated
sections. The setup provides the equivalent thermo-hydraulic
configuration of the ITER CS/STR, cooled by the forced-flow
Supercritical Helium (SHe). The dynamic simulator, C-PREST,
has been utilized to model the HELIOS test loop and to compare
the results with the experimental data sets. This paper presents the
dynamic simulation results and discusses the control strategy to
minimize the cooling power requirements, to have high reliability.
Fig. 1. A schematic of ITER cryogenic system consists of Cryoplant, Cold
Index Terms—Dynamic simulation, fluid dynamics, supercritical Compressor Box (CCB) and ACBs; only two ACBs are shown. Five ACBs will
helium. be installed to operate, CS, Toroidal Field (TF) coil, STR, Poloidal Field (PF)/
Correction Coil (CC) and CryoPump system. The saturated vapor pressure of
LHe reservoirs are regulated by the Cold Compressor (CC) in the CCB, except
PF/CC and CryoPump system which has dedicated CCs.
I. INTRODUCTION

I TER cryoplant requires to sustain the stable operation for

the superconducting coil system under a wide range of
plasma operation scenarios which induces substantial pulsating
heat loads to the cryoplant [1]. To ensure the high reliability
of operation, a distributed cooling scheme has been employed:
five Auxiliary Cold Boxes (ACBs) to support each cooling ob-
ject as shown in Fig. 1. A unique feature of ACB is having two
heat exchanger bypass valves to regulate the energy dissipation
in the LHe reservoir.
To develop the ACBs operation strategy, a series of experi-
ment is being conducted at CEA-Grenoble, utilizing a sub-scale
test loop with approximately 1/60 scale to STR cooling loop [2].
In addition to this, a dynamic simulator development program
for ACB has been launched at NIFS, to perform its design op-
timization, to identify operations constraints and to investigate
the dynamic response of the system.
HELIOS test loop has been implemented to C-PREST [3] to
confirm the feasibility of simulation model. The simulated re-
sults have been compared with the experimental data sets; the
re-production of Central Solenoid (CS) pressure profile and the
Manuscript received September 08, 2011; accepted December 21, 2011. Date
of publication March 05, 2012; date of current version May 24, 2012. This work
was supported in part by the ITER Service Contract IO-RT-10-3320.
R. Maekawa, H. S. Chang, A. Forgeas, and L. Serio are with ITER Organi-
zation, Route de Vinon sur Verdon 13115, St Paul Lez Durance Cedex France
(e-mail: ryuji.maekawa@iter.org).
K. Oba, S. Takami, and A. Iwamoto are with National Institute for Fusion
Science, Toki, Gifu 509-5292, Japan.
R. Vallocorba, B. Rousset, C. Hoa, and L. Monteireo are with CEA-Grenoble
38054 Grenoble Cedex 9, France.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TASC.2012.2184513
peak-to-peak heat load reduction technique, namely “Mitiga-
tion” [4], [5]. Consequently, the modeling approach will be ver-
ified to establish the strategy for ACB modeling and to evaluate
the robustness under dynamic conditions.
The paper describes the development of a dynamic simulation
model which is compared with the experimental results. Further,
the comparison of process control with the experiments is also
discussed.
II. TEST LOOP IMPLEMENTATION
A. HELIOS Test Loop
Fig. 2 shows a schematic of HELIOS, which consist of three
test sections for independent heat inputs, a Circulation Pump
(CP), and two heat exchangers immersed in the LHe reservoir.
Test sections are composed of approximately 30 mm inner di-
ameter with 130 m long stainless steel piping wounded in 2 m di-
ameter. Process values such as temperature, pressure and mass-
flow rates were measured to evaluate the energy balance in the
different flow paths. Two heat exchanger bypass valves, shown
in solid black in the figure, are utilized to perform Mitigation.
SHe inventory in the test loop is approximately 1/60 of STR
cooling circuit, the CP speed was determined based on this
number with respect to the transit time of SHe in the loop. The
experiments are only focused on the most critical operating
condition for ITER cryoplant, which corresponds to the D-T
operation with 500 MW fusion power productions. At this time,
the heat loads to the LHe cryoplant will vary roughly from
30 kW to 60 kW in 1800 s period.

1051-8223/$31.00 © 2012
4704004 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON APPLIED SUPERCONDUCTIVITY, VOL. 22, NO. 3, JUNE 2012

Fig. 3. A schematic of CS pressure profile reproduction experiment. The CP

Fig. 2. A schematic of HELIOS test loop; SHe supply and low pressure return discharge side of heat exchanger was used and the bypass valve was closed.
lines are connected from/to the helium refrigerator.

B. Implementation to C-PREST
1) Modeling Strategy: A large variation of thermo-physical
properties and compressible nature of SHe leads to accelera-
tion/deceleration of the fluid as it is subjected to the time depen-
dent large heat inputs. If the model was implemented to include
the SHe inventory in the entire test loop, the simulator has to
solve a set of linearized one-dimensional Navier-Stokes equa-
tions. This approach is contradictory to the objective of process
study since it requires heavy CPU loads. The priority for the
simulator is to keep the computation real-time rather than de-
scribing the thermo-hydraulic behavior of SHe in detail. There-
fore, the SHe inventory in the test loop was neglected and the
net heat flux to the test loop was adjusted as conserving the in-
ternal energy variation with respect to the dynamic heat load. Fig. 4. Variation of heat inputs to each test section for the experiment. The
The modeling approach should be sufficient for the process heat input to the simulation model are approximately 49% of experimental
values; which corresponds to the fraction of volume ratio between the entire
study since the process is considered as a quasi-static condi-
loop volume to the test section.
tion. The test loop was considered as a closed system: isochoric
process. Since it uses the volume ratio of the test section to the
entire loop, this represents the available internal energy subject
III. SIMULATION RESULT AND DISCUSSION
to the dynamic heat loads. The heat inputs to the test section
were adjusted based on this volume ratio: test section volume A. CS Pressure Profile With a CP’s Discharge HX
divided by the entire volume. According to this simplified mod-
eling strategy, the computational speed is three times faster than Due to the inductively driven plasma current, the CS cooling
the real time. A drawback is the lack of describing the very fast circuit experiences substantial pressure build up [5] (Fig. 3). The
event: a drastic heat pulse input to the loop. experiments were conducted to reproduce the pressure profile in
2) CP Modeling: The simulation model has to consist of the the CS cooling circuit, by manually regulating the heat input to
data based on “as-build” test loop components such as, control each test section, as shown in Fig. 4. In order to reproduce a
valves, heat exchangers, LHe reservoir and piping. The most of drastic pressure increase, the initial heat pulse was much larger
these components can be modeled by C-PREST except a SHe than the rest of heat inputs.
CP. The CP model has been developed based on the dimensional Fig. 5 shows the comparison of pressure profile with the dy-
analyses; Buckingham theorem [6]. As defining the head co- namic simulation. At the initial stage of a large heat pulse, the
efficient and the flow coefficient , the characteristics of simulation result shows instantaneous pressure increase. The
circulation pump can be represented by a single curve. discrepancy is originated from the simplified test loop model
and the heat input needs to be adjusted to take into account the
transit time of SHe in the loop. In the case of quasi-steady state
(1)
condition, after 300 s, the model showed a good agreement with
the experiment.
(2)
One of the critical problems for this verification test is to un-
derstand the CP operation field. The sudden pressure increase
where is the pressure head, is density, is impeller di- in the loop is undesirable to the CP operation, leading to the CP
ameter, is rotation speed, and is mass flow. The function trip. According to (1) and (2), the operating conditions of CP
, , can be obtained by the technical specification are mapped as shown in Fig. 6. The initial heat pulse in the sim-
provided by the vendors. This approach allows extending the ulation model could expose the CP to a surge condition, while
modeling for ITER relevant CP for each ACB. other cases do not represent any risk.
MAEKAWA et al.: DYNAMIC SIMULATION OF SUB-SCALE ITER CS/STR COOLING LOOP
Fig. 5. Comparison of pressure profile with experiment. The simulation data
shows fairly good agreement except at the beginning of heat pulse at ,
where the substantial heat input was introduced in the test loop.
Fig. 6. Comparison of CP operation with the experiment for the first 300 s.
The discrepancies in the operation fields are caused by the difference in the
magnitude of dP/dt. The surge condition is based on the vendor specification.
As protecting the operation of ACB for ITER, the anti-surge
control strategy has to be established not to impose potential
risk on the CP trip. This is one of objectives of dynamic simu-
lator which can investigate the critical operation of CP in detail
without having any risk of the component failure.
Simulation results indicates that the CP operation will have
the risk to the surge condition; relevant to the numerical results
[5]. The fluid inertia may have a positive effect to decrease the
magnitude of in the loop, which has to be confirmed
by further analyses and/or experiments. The process control to
prevent the CP operation to surge condition can be established
based on the technical specification of CP.
B. Mitigation; Heat Exchanger Bypass Valve
Mitigation was performed as regulating the massflow rates
from LHe reservoir in terms of a heat exchanger bypass valve
control, as shown in Fig. 7. The heat inputs were applied from
one of three test sections for simplification.
Fig. 8 represents the bypass valve variation as a function of
pulsating heat inputs. A classical Proportional Integral (PI) con-
trol was initiated at the onset of a 2nd heat pulse to verify its
4704004
Fig. 7. A schematic shows the simplified test loop setup for the mitigation. A
bypass valve was controlled with a classical Proportional-Integral (PI), as the
return massflow from the reservoir as a control variable.
Fig. 8. Comparison of a bypass valve variation as regulating the low pressure
return flow from the LHe reservoir. As heat pulses were applied to the test sec-
tion, the bypass valve was regulated to reduce the peak-to-peak heat load ratio
to the LHe reservoir. The control scheme is considered as maintaining the con-
stant heat load to the cryoplant, as regulating the evaporation of LHe from the
LHe reservoir.
effectiveness. To compare the process control with the experi-
ment, the simulator removed the opening limit of a bypass valve
at 60%. The value was imposed for the experiment to prevent
the safety valve activation.
Fig. 9 shows the resulting massflow rate variation in the test
loop. As opening the bypass valve, the massflow rate to the
heat exchanger decreases. Despite the difference in the valve
opening, the minimum flow rate is comparable to the experi-
ment. Since the stroke of valve stem has been adjusted for the
experimental setup, there are some differences in the resulting
massflow rates obtained by the simulation.
The variations of loop pressure were also compared with the
experiment as shown in Fig. 10. The dynamic simulator reveals
the same tendency of process control with the experiment. In
this particular operation, the regulation for the experiment was
insufficient, leading to the gradual average pressure increase.
The simulator, however, establish better process control so that
the pressure profile after three heat pulses are identical.
Implemented model demonstrate its process control as inde-
pendently setup the classical PI control. The discrepancy in the
valve opening is one of the common factors to be implemented
4704004
Fig. 9. Massflow rate variation in the Heat eXchanger (HX) during the Miti-
gation by the bypass valve. As opening the bypass valve, the massflow rate to
the heat exchanger decreases.
Fig. 10. The loop pressure variation compared with the experimental results.
for the modeling accuracy. Mitigation scheme, suppression of
the variation of energy dissipation in the LHe reservoir, has been
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON APPLIED SUPERCONDUCTIVITY, VOL. 22, NO. 3, JUNE 2012
confirmed and revealed the importance of the process control
strategy.
The classical PI control was inadequate to suppress the vari-
ation of energy dissipation in the LHe reservoir. The opening of
bypass valve was delayed compared with the onset of heat pulse.
To improve this tracking error, the feed-forward plus feedback
control should be implemented. According to the developed
simulation model, the system identification can be applied to
obtain the feed-forward control unit. As implementing a certain
model error to compensate the difference in the actual opera-
tion, the model should be robust enough to minimize tracking
errors.
IV. SUMMARY
The dynamic simulation model has been developed and
compared with the HELIOS test loop experimental results. The
model demonstrated its capability to describe the mitigation
process with a classical PI control. The model will be served as
a platform to study advanced controls, which improve tracking
errors and suppress peak-to-peak energy dissipation in the LHe
reservoir. As a result, the high reliability and efficiency of ITER
cryoplant operation will be established.
Since the model was simplified to sustain the fast compu-
tation, preserving the interactive condition for the simulator,
further improvement/adjustment of modeling is required to de-
scribe the fast event with substantial heat inputs.
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