Feasibility Study of Supercritical Light Water Cooled Fast Reactors for Actinide Burning and Electric Power Production, Progress Report for Work Through September 2002, 4th Quarterly Report

Technical Report · Sun Sep 01 00:00:00 EDT 2002

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/910947· OSTI ID:910947

Mac Donald, Philip Elsworth

The use of light water at supercritical pressures as the coolant in a nuclear reactor offers the potential for considerable plant simplification and consequent capital and O&M cost reduction compared with current light water reactor (LWR) designs. Also, given the thermodynamic conditions of the coolant at the core outlet (i.e. temperature and pressure beyond the water critical point), very high thermal efficiencies of the power conversion cycle are possible (i.e. up to about 45%). Because no change of phase occurs in the core, the need for steam separators and dryers as well as for BWR-type re-circulation pumps is eliminated, which, for a given reactor power, results in a substantially shorter reactor vessel and smaller containment building than the current BWRs. Furthermore, in a direct cycle the steam generators are not needed. If no additional moderator is added to the fuel rod lattice, it is possible to attain fast neutron energy spectrum conditions in a supercritical water-cooled reactor (SCWR). This type of core can make use of either fertile or fertile-free fuel and retain a hard spectrum to effectively burn plutonium and minor actinides from LWR spent fuel while efficiently generating electricity. One can also add moderation and design a thermal spectrum SCWR. The Generation IV Roadmap effort has identified the thermal spectrum SCWR (followed by the fast spectrum SCWR) as one of the advanced concepts that should be developed for future use. Therefore, the work in this NERI project is addressing both types of SCWRs.

• Research Organization: Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE
• DOE Contract Number: DE-AC07-99ID-13727
• OSTI ID: 910947
• Report Number(s): INEEL/EXT-02-01330; TRN: US0704304
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

99 - GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS//MATHEMATICS, COMPUTING, AND INFORMATION SCIENCE
ACTINIDES
CONTAINMENT BUILDINGS
COOLANTS
ELECTRIC POWER
ELECTRICITY
FAST NEUTRONS
FAST REACTORS
FUEL RODS
MODERATORS
PLUTONIUM
PRODUCTION
PROGRESS REPORT
REACTOR VESSELS
REACTORS
SPENT FUELS
STEAM GENERATORS
STEAM SEPARATORS
THERMODYNAMICS
WATER COOLED REACTORS
actinide burning
supercritical light water cooled fast reactors