Gaseous fuel reactors for power systems
The Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory is participating in a NASA-sponsored program to demonstrate the feasibility of a gaseous uranium fueled reactor. The work is aimed at acquiring experimental and theoretical information for the design of a prototype plasma core reactor which will test heat removal by optical radiation. The basic goal of this work is for space applications, however, other NASA-sponsored work suggests several attractive applications to help meet earth-bound energy needs. Such potential benefits are: small critical mass, on-site fuel processing, high fuel burnup, low fission fragment inventory in reactor core, high temperature for process heat, optical radiation for photochemistry and space power transmissions, and high temperature for advanced propulsion systems. Low power reactor experiments using uranium hexafluoride gas as fuel demonstrated performance in accordance with reactor physics predictions. The final phase of experimental activity now in progress is the fabrication and testing of a buffer gas vortex confinement system.
- OSTI ID:
- 5625977
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Related Subjects
GAS FUELED REACTORS
FEASIBILITY STUDIES
RESEARCH PROGRAMS
SPACE POWER REACTORS
FISSIONING PLASMA
NASA
URANIUM HEXAFLUORIDE
ACTINIDE COMPOUNDS
FLUID FUELED REACTORS
FLUORIDES
FLUORINE COMPOUNDS
HALIDES
HALOGEN COMPOUNDS
HOMOGENEOUS REACTORS
MOBILE REACTORS
NATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS
PLASMA
POWER REACTORS
REACTORS
URANIUM COMPOUNDS
URANIUM FLUORIDES
US ORGANIZATIONS
NESDPS Office of Nuclear Energy Space and Defense Power Systems
210600* - Power Reactors
Auxiliary
Mobile Package
& Transportable