Preliminary evaluation of U₃Si₂-FeCrAl fuel performance in light water reactors through a multi-physics coupled way

U₃Si₂-FeCrAl fuel system is a potential choice for Accident Tolerant Fuel (ATF) for its higher uranium density, improved fuel thermal conductivity and stronger oxidation resistance. In this work, a new multi-physic fuel performance code called BEEs for LWR fuels has been developed based on Multiphysics Object-Oriented Simulation Environment (MOOSE) using the Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) method. As a first step to verify the capability of BEEs, one problem has been conducted using BEEs and compared with the results from BISON and ABAQUS. Then, the most recently available U₃Si₂-FeCrAl behavior models have been coded in BEEs. Fuel performance analysis was conducted for U₃Si₂-FeCrAl fuel system using BEEs and comparisons with UO₂-Zr4 and U₃Si₂-Zr4 were made in this work. The results show that U₃Si₂-FeCrAl fuel system can lower the fuel peaking temperature about 300 K and have flat radial temperature distribution which can mitigate or eliminate the fuel cracking during power up. Further, the pellet-cladding mechanic interaction can be delayed or fully eliminated employing U₃Si₂-FeCrAl fuel system in light water reactors (LWRs).