Models of liquid metal corrosion

Abstract In the present study, models for liquid metal corrosion are reviewed and their applications in nuclear reactor engineering are discussed. The paper presents mathematical analysis of liquid metal corrosion, including species transport in solid steels, in flowing liquid metals, and mass exchange at liquid/solid interface. The survey illustrates the mechanisms of the liquid metal corrosion and sets up a system to calculate the corrosion rate and to study the corrosion species distributions in the solid and liquid metal/alloys. Both light liquid metal/alloy (sodium and sodium–potassium) and heavy liquid metal/alloy (liquid lead and lead–bismuth) are considered. Oxygen effects on liquid metal corrosion are also discussed. For liquid sodium and sodium–potassium the corrosion rate increases with increasing oxygen concentration, while for liquid lead and lead–bismuth it is reasonable to produce a protective oxide layer using an oxygen control technique which can mitigate the corrosion rate significantly. Finally, the corrosion–oxidation interaction in liquid lead and lead–bismuth are discussed.