The UAE Ministry of Energy and Industry opened the Emirates Nuclear Technology Center, at Khalifa University’s Sas Al Nakhl Campus in Abu Dhabi, UAE, to support the long-term sustainability of the UAE Peaceful Nuclear Energy Program by creating a dedicated innovation hub for peaceful nuclear technologies.
A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was exchanged by His Excellency Suhail Bin Mohammed Faraj Faris Al Mazrouei, UAE Minister of Energy and Industry, and His Excellency Lee Taeho, Second Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs, Republic of Korea, during the opening ceremony, attended by His Excellency Engineer Mohamed Al Hammadi, Chief Executive Officer of ENEC, Christer Viktorsson Director General of the Federal Authority of Nuclear Regulation (FANR), Dr. Arif Sultan Al Hammadi Executive Vice President of Khalifa University, and senior officials from all five entities.
The MoU between the UAE MoEI and the Ministry of Science, and Information and Communications Technology of Korea, under the UAE-Korea Consultation Committee on Nuclear Technology, outlines the framework of cooperation on research projects between the center’s relevant partners.
The Emirates Nuclear Technology Center will engage in research projects designed and approved by ENEC and FANR, and will be conducted by students, academics and researchers from Khalifa University. The Center’s initial research projects will focus on three areas – nuclear safety and systems, nuclear materials science and chemistry, and radiation safety in the environment.
Through the MoU, the ENTC will benefit from sharing of knowledge and expertise from the Korean nuclear energy industry, which has been operating for over 40 years, along with experience in developing nuclear research reactors.
“It is my pleasure to launch the Emirates Nuclear Technology Centre in Abu Dhabi, which is an outcome of our collaborative approach with our South Korean government counterparts and all UAE nuclear stakeholders, who are working to further Nuclear Science & Technology Research and Development. Investing in research and innovation are prerequisites for the long-term success of the UAE’s peaceful nuclear energy industry. It will further position the UAE as an international role model for the development of a peaceful nuclear energy program by building UAE National capabilities and conducting industry-leading research on radiation safety and nuclear energy technologies,” said His Excellency Suhail Al Mazrouei.
“Within the frame of the High-Level Consultation on Nuclear Cooperation, we and our UAE partner are expanding areas of cooperation in the Barakah Nuclear Energy Plant construction and operations, new nuclear energy project in third countries, nuclear R&D, and safety regulations. I believe that the MoU on nuclear energy and R&D cooperation will serve as a catalyst that will further accelerate our bilateral nuclear energy cooperation”, said His Excellency Lee Taeho,.
H.E. Eng. Mohamed Al Hammadi, CEO of ENEC, said: “We are delighted to be part of this initiative to establish the Emirates Nuclear Technology Center. As the UAE’s emerging peaceful nuclear energy industry continues to grow and develop, collaboration and cooperation between academia and industry will allow us to ensure the long-term sustainability of the UAE Peaceful Nuclear Energy Program, as well as enhancing our global competitiveness and high standards of safety. Through its projects and research the Center will provide talented UAE Nationals with the opportunity to work alongside international experts in conducting cutting-edge research, thereby developing their skills and capabilities within the field of peaceful nuclear energy.”
Dr Arif Sultan Al Hammadi, Executive Vice-President, Khalifa University of Science and Technology, said: “We are delighted to join the official launch of the Emirates Nuclear Technology Center (ENTC), hosted on our campus, in collaboration with our stakeholders including our partners ENEC and FANR. The ENTC reflects another strong commitment from Khalifa University to contribute to enhancing the UAE’s nuclear technology research capability and support our key stakeholder’s goals for the delivery of safe, clean and efficient nuclear technology to meet the UAE 2030 vision. The center will significantly optimize the multidisciplinary capabilities through Khalifa University’s diverse community of faculty and researchers to meet the national objectives.”
“We are delighted to join our national and international stakeholders in launching the Emirates Nuclear Technology Centre. Investing in research and innovation in nuclear technologies is indispensable to ensure the sustainability of the nuclear program. We will work closely with our partners to identify priority areas, focus on strategic nuclear sector research, ensure continuity of projects and provide support to national and international initiatives in line with FANR’s R & D Policy, which was launched in 2017. FANR will support the mandate of the new center by utilizing its Research and Development Program. FANR’s Research and Development Program aims to develop and attract Emiratis by providing opportunities for postgraduate education and research in the nuclear field. It also aims to ensure sound technical basis for all regulatory activities, mitigate risks related to safety, security and safeguards in the UAE nuclear sector,” said Christer Viktorsson, Director-General of the Federal Authority for Nuclear Regulation (FANR) in the UAE.
The establishment of the Emirates Nuclear Technology Center will cement the UAE’s position as an international role model for the development of a new peaceful nuclear energy projects around the globe. Innovation and continuous development are essential to the sustainability and long-term success of the UAE’s peaceful nuclear energy industry, as well as the UAE’s ongoing transition to a knowledge-based economy and society.
The MoU comes at a pivotal time for ENEC, with the 4 Units of Barakah Nuclear Energy Plant more than 93% complete. Unit 4 is over 82% complete, Unit 3 is more than 91% and Unit 2 is more than 95%. Unit 1 construction has been completed and is currently undergoing operational readiness preparations pending regulatory approval and receipt of the Operating License for Unit 1 from FANR, anticipated in early 2020.
After the launch of ENTC and the MoU signing, His Excellency Suhail Al Mazroui, His Excellency Lee Taeho and members of the official delegation from Korea, ENEC, and FANR along with Khalifa University senior management team, faculty members and researchers toured the research facility.
Later, delegation members from the two countries attended the second meeting of the ‘UAE-Korea high-level consultations on nuclear cooperation’.
ATLAS (Advanced Thermal-hydraulic Test Loop for Accident Simulation) facility has been constructed to develop new safety concepts and verify their performance in APR1400. Valuable large-scale integral effect test (IET) data were produced and effectively utilized for domestic standard program (DSP) and International standard program (ISP). ATLAS has been recognized as one of the important IET facilities worldwide since the ISP-50 was successfully completed in 2011, where 14 organizations from 11 OECD countries participated.
OECD/NEA ATLAS project has been initiated in 2014 for further international cooperation to deal with common safety issues relevant to PWR, and proposed five topics related to beyond design basis accidents. UAE is participating in the project to increase local human capability on safety analysis. To this end, FANR and Khalifa University are planning to cooperate in the UAE participation to the ATLAS project, which will consist in conducting numerical simulations, using RELAP5; the blind pre-test and post-test simulations. The blind pre-tests rely on only specification of experiment given by the operating agency. The post-test simulation can be performed after acquiring experiment data from the operating agency.
At the start of the project, the Operating Agency (OA), KAERI, has provided the steady-state input deck of RELAP5/MOD3 for ATLAS facility to all participants. Then each participating agency has to generate its own transient input in accordance with proposed experiment scenarios. Although this might seem a trivial exercise at first glance, the generation of transient input is strongly dependant on experience and know-how level of the user groups. The given steady-state inputs also need to be modified and some component have to be remodelled to cope with the newly proposed scenario. For this reason, previous similar projects revealed that each participating agency come up with different results even though they have been using the same safety analysis code.
Preparation of input, running simulation, debugging process, interpretation of results and all lessons learned will be consolidated as a training material for increasing local human capability on safety analysis.
Additionally, at least one local component will be selected from each proposed scenario to investigate the detailed thermal hydraulic phenomena using the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) approach. Simulation results from RELAP5 will then be compared with both; the CFD predictions and the experimental data from ATLAS facility.
Dr. Yacine Addad, Associate Professor of Nuclear Engineering and Theme-1 lead of the Emirates Nuclear Technology Center (ENTC), is leading collaborative research project with IRSN, France and FANR, UAE. The project is being funded by the Federal Authority for the Nuclear Regulation, UAE.
The aim of this research program is to enhance the capabilities of the UAE to simulate radionuclides dispersion in marine, atmospheric and continental environments taking account for regional and local features. Since UAE has started the nuclear program by constructing four nuclear power plants, UAE is putting intensive efforts in increasing human capability on nuclear safety. This objective is in-line with the Abu Dhabi Economic Vision 2030 as it serves the purpose of the development of a highly-skilled, science-oriented, workforce of UAE Nationals, and it lays the foundations for research & development in the field of nuclear energy safe usage, which not only supports the Plan’s goal of diversification of the Emirate’s economy but also minimizes the impact of this newly adopted sustainable energy source on the natural environment.
The safe, reliable, and economic operation of the UAE’s nuclear power plants at Barakah has been at the heart of the nation’s nuclear energy program since its inception in 2008 with the publication of the “UAE Policy on the Peaceful Use of Nuclear Energy” document. Following the events at Fukushima, Accident Tolerant Fuels (ATFs) became a focus within the nuclear fuel R&D community. Using ATFs in the existing APR1400 Barakah reactors would help endure loss of active cooling in the reactor core for a considerably longer period of time, and therefore would be safer, than the current fuel system while maintaining or improving performance during normal operations. To achieve this goal, many assessments will be needed including neutronics, thermal-hydraulic, thermo-mechanical/chemical, and fuel performance analyses for several candidate ATF concepts. In performing final assessments, the “do no harm” principle will be observed, meaning that the selected ATF concepts must, under all operating conditions, perform as well as or better than the current fuel system used in the APR1400 reactor core.
Recently, a KU team lead by Dr. Saeed Alameri and 6 more faculty members, along with 3 external collaborators from MIT, KAIST and University of Manchester won a high value grant of the Ministry of Education Collaborative Research Program Grant 2019 in which just 4 awards were selected out of 238 proposals in the whole country. The topic is about (Evaluation of Using Accident Tolerant Fuel Concepts in APR1400) with a total amount of almost AED 7M. The following are the main objectives of this research:
Dispersion models predict the spread and deposition of natural or anthropogenic radionuclides in the atmosphere.This project systematically examines the key physical processes influencing transport, deposition, charge evolution, decay, and coagulation of radioactive aerosols focusing on the UAE’s hot, arid climate and dust outbreaks.
Faizan, I Afgan | Accepted
“Dynamic Assessment and Optimization of Thermal Energy Storage Integration with Nuclear Power Plants Using Machine Learning and Computational Fluid Dynamics” Applied Energy
Faizan, AK Alkaabi, I Afgan |
“Influence of variable gravity on the phase change material for enclosed vertical channels with helical fins” Applied Thermal Engineering
Faizan, AK Alkaabi, B Nie, I Afgan |
“Thermal energy storage integration with nuclear power: A critical review” Journal of Energy Storage
The findings from this study indicate that
Theme 2 focuses on Improving nuclear plant safety and durability through advanced materials. Key efforts include corrosion-resistant coatings, concrete degradation mitigation, ATF cladding evaluation, and HDPE pipe welding optimization.
These initiatives enhance the reliability of nuclear infrastructure.
Curvature markedly affects flow boiling heat transfer on downward-facing surfaces, highlighting the need for to develop predictive models and optimize geometrics for enhanced thermal performance in reactor safety applications.
This research examines condensation heat transfer in nuclear passive cooling systems, highlighting thermal resistance caused by non condensable gases. It integrates experiments, TRACE simulations, and machine learning to improve understanding and optimize reactor safety and performance.
Reactor containment buldings (RCBs) as the last barrier to the release of radioactive materials play a critical role in the nuclear power plants (NPPs). Thus, the integrity of RCBs has been studied as one of the projects in the ENTC.
Several MSc students in Nuclear Engineering have participated in the project and after graduation they are actively working on the safety and security areas of NPPs at FANR and ENC/NAWAH. Sara Al Hanaee, one of the MSc graduates, completed her MSc Thesis titled ‘Effect of aging on ultimate pressure capacity of nuclear reactor containment building, which was published in a journal named ‘Nuclear Engineering and Design’. She was one of the three winners of the competition at the 10th anniversary of the World Institute for Nuclear Security (WINS) operation in 2018. Also, while working at FANR, she was a winner of FANR Annual Award “Exceptional Employee Award” in 2019.
