A Stainless-Steel, Uranium-Dioxide, Potassium-Heatpipe-Cooled Surface Reactor
- Nuclear Systems Design Group, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico 87545 (United States)
One of the primary goals in designing a fission power system is to ensure that the system can be developed at a low cost and on an acceptable schedule without compromising reliability. The Heatpipe Power System (HPS) is one possible approach for producing near-term, low-cost, space fission power. The Heatpipe Operated Moon Exploration Reactor (HOMER-25) is a HPS designed to produce 25-kWe on the lunar surface for 5 full-power years. The HOMER-25 core is made up of 93% enriched UO2 fuel pins and stainless-steel (SS)/potassium (K) heatpipes in a SS monolith. The heatpipes transport heat generated in the core through the water shield to a potassium boiler, which drives six Stirling engines. The operating heatpipe temperature is 880 K and the peak fast fluence is 1.6e21 n/cm2, which is well within an established database for the selected materials. The HOMER-25 is designed to be buried in 1.5 m of lunar regolith during operation. By using technology and materials which do not require extensive technology development programs, the HOMER-25 could be developed at a relatively low cost. This paper describes the attributes, specifications, and performance of the HOMER-25 reactor system.
- OSTI ID:
- 20797987
- Journal Information:
- AIP Conference Proceedings, Journal Name: AIP Conference Proceedings Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 813; ISSN APCPCS; ISSN 0094-243X
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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