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Critical Review of Radiolysis Issues in Water-Cooled Reactors: History
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Subjects: Others
Contributor: Digby Macdonald ,
George R. Engelhardt

The radiolysis of water is a significant cause of corrosion damage in the primary heat transport systems (PHTSs) of water-cooled, fission nuclear power reactors (BWRs, PWRs, and CANDUs) and is projected to be a significant factor in the evolution of corrosion damage in future fusion reactors (e.g., the ITER that is currently under development). In Part I of this two-part series, we reviewed the proposed mechanisms for the radiolysis of water and demonstrate that radiolysis leads to the formation of a myriad of oxidizing and reducing species. In this Part II, we review the role that the radiolysis species play in establishing the electrochemical corrosion potential (ECP) and the development of corrosion damage due to intergranular stress corrosion cracking (IGSCC) in reactor PHTSs.

  • Nuclear Reactors
  • Water Cooled
  • Corrosion potential
  • Crack growth rate
  • Stress corrosion cracking.
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  2. Petrov, D. Macdonald, and G. Engelhardt, “Assessment of Radiolysis in Tokamak Cooling Water System of ITER Fusion Reactor”, Proceedings of the 21st International Conference on Water Chemistry in Nuclear Reactor Systems, September 9 – 14, 2018, San-Francisco, CA. EPRI, Palo Alto, CA, 2019: 3002016101
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  6. Cragnolino, SCC in 304 at cathodic potentials.
  7. R. Engelhardt and D. D. Macdonald, unpublished data (2021).
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  17. K. Yeh, D. D. Macdonald, and A. T. Motta. “Modeling Water Chemistry, Electrochemical Corrosion Potential, and Crack Growth Rate in the Boiling Water Reactor Heat Transport Circuits-Part III: Effect of Reactor Power Level,” Nucl. Sci. Eng. 123 (1996): 305–316.
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  20. K. Yeh, and D. D. Macdonald. “Effects of Power Level Change on the Development of Damage in Boiling Water Reactors under Hydrogen Water Chemistry,” Paper # 126, pp. 126/1–126/12. Corrosion/96, NACE International, Houston, Texas, March 26–31, 1996.
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  33. Zhou, Macdonald, D. D. and I. Balachov, “Enhancing the Operation of Boiling Water Reactors by Deterministic Simulation”, Proc. Water Chemistry ‘98, 1998 JAIF Int. Conf. Water Chem. Nucl. Power Plants, Kashiwazaki, Japan, Oct. 13-16 (1998).
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  39. -S. Kim and D. D. Macdonald, “PWSCC of Mill-annealed Alloy 600 in PWR Primary Coolant Circuits,” in preparation (2021).
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  41. Urquidi-Macdonald, J. Pitt, and D. D. Macdonald, “The Impact of Radiolytic Yield on the Calculated ECP in PWR Primary Coolant Circuits,” J. Nucl. Mat. 362, no. 1 (2007): 1–13.
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  49. Shi, B. Fekete, J. Wang, and D. D. Macdonald, Customization of the coupled environment fracture model for predicting stress corrosion cracking in Alloy 600 in PWR environment, Corrosion Science, 139, 58-67 (2018).
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