Theoretical Analysis of Effective Thermal Conductivity for the Chinese HTR-PM Heat Transfer Test Facility

The Chinese high temperature gas-cooled reactor pebble bed module (HTR-PM) demonstration project has attracted increasing attention. In order to support the project, a large-scale heat transfer test facility has been constructed for pebble bed effective thermal conductivity measurement over the whole temperature range (0~1600 ◦C). Based on different heat transfer mechanisms in the randomly packed pebble bed, three different types of effective thermal conductivity have been theoretically evaluated. A prediction of the total effective thermal conductivity of the pebble bed over the whole temperature range is provided for the optimization of the test facility and guidance of further experiments.