Thermo-mechanical analyses and model validation in the HAW test field. Final report

摘要

An overview is given of the thermo-mechanical analysis work done for the design of the High Active Waste experiment and for the purpose of validation of the used models through comparison with experiments. A brief treatise is given on the problems of validation of models used for the prediction of physical behaviour which cannot be determined with experiments. The analysis work encompasses investigations into the initial state of stress in the field, the constitutive relations, the temperature rise, and the pressure on the liner tubes inserted in the field to guarantee the retrievability of the radioactive sources used for the experiment. The measurements of temperatures, deformations, and stresses are described and an evaluation is given of the comparison of measured and calculated data. An attempt has been made to qualify or even quantify the discrepancies, if any, between measurements and calculations. It was found that the model for the temperature calculations performed adequately. For the stresses the general tendency was good, however, large discrepancies exist mainly due to inaccuracies in the measurements. For the deformations again the general tendency of the model predictions was in accordance with the measurements. However, from the evaluation it appears that in spite of the efforts to estimate the correct initial rock pressure at the location of the experiment, this pressure has been underestimated. The evaluation has contributed to a considerable increase in confidence in the models and gives no reason to question the constitutive model for rock salt. However, due to the quality of the measurements of the stress and the relatively short period of the experiments no quantitatively firm support for the constitutive model is acquired. Collections of graphs giving the measured and calculated data are attached as appendices. (orig.). (Atomindex citation 27:020194)