Passivity-Based Control of Nuclear Reactors Considering Cold Side Temperature

Nuclear fission reactors are crucial clean energy sources being able to provide power and heat continuously in a central way with great amount. Small modular reactors (SMRs) are the nuclear fission reactors with electric power output less than 300 MWe, which are usually endowed with a series of inherent safety features such as low power density, strong negative temperature feedback effect and passive residual heat removing. SMRs can be adopted to interconnect with renewable plants for building nuclear-renewable hybrid energy systems (NRHES), where SMRs can be applied to balance the fluctuating net load induced by the intermittence of renewables. To enhance the stability of NRHES, it is necessary to further strengthen the control performance of SMR. Though the cold primary coolant temperature reflects the heat transfer balance between primary and secondary circuits, it is still not considered in reactor control design. In this paper, a passivity-based control of nuclear reactors is proposed by considering the cold primary coolant temperature, which is able to regulate the neutron flux as well as both the hot and cold coolant temperatures. Simulation results show the feasibility and satisfactory performance.