Part A: A Scalable Approach to Commercial Nuclear Power: NuScale Power's New Approach to Safety and Deployment of Nuclear Plants. Part B: New Deliberations in Nuclear Modular Construction—Westinghouse Small Modular Reactor

2014 ◽  
pp. 32-1-32-21
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Modular Construction ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Nuclear Plants ◽  
Small Modular Reactor

Conceptual Design of a 4 × 300 MW Modular Nuclear Plant

2011 ◽  
Author(s):  
Asko Vuorinen
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Power Plants ◽  
Nuclear Plant ◽  
Medium Size ◽  
Modular Construction ◽  
Construction Costs ◽  
University Of Technology ◽  
Nuclear Plants ◽  
Original Estimate ◽  
Under Construction

The Finnish companies have built four medium size nuclear power plants. In addition they have constructed two nuclear icebreakers and several floating power plants. The latest 1650 MWe nuclear power plant under construction Olkiluoto-3 has had many problems, which have raised the costs of the plant to €3500/kWe from its original estimate of €2000/kWe and constriction schedule from four to eight years. It is possible to keep the costs down and schedule short by making the plant in shipyard and transport it to site by sea. The plant could be then lifted to its place by pumping seawater into the channel. This kind of concept was developed by the author in 1991, when he was making his thesis of modular gas fired power plants in Helsinki University of Technology. The modular construction of nuclear plants has made in a form of two nuclear icebreakers, which Wa¨rtsila¨ Marine has built in Helsinki Shipyard. The latest modular nuclear plant was launched in 2010 in St Petersburg shipyard. One of the benefits of modular construction is a possibility to locate the plant under rock by making the transportation channels in tunnels. This will give the plant external protection for aircraft crash and make the outer containment unnecessary. The water channels could also be used as pressure suppression pools in case of venting steam from the containment. This could reduce the radioactive releases in case of possible reactor accidents. The two 440 MW VVER plants build in Finland had construction costs of €1600 /kWe at 2011 money. The author believes that a 1200 MW nuclear plant with four 300 MW units can be constructed in five years and with €3300/kW costs, where the first plant could be generating power within 40 months and next units with 6 month intervals.

scholarly journals Off-site modular construction and design in nuclear power: A systematic literature review

2021 ◽  
Vol 134 ◽  
pp. 103664
Author(s):  
P.A. Wrigley ◽  
P. Wood ◽  
S. O'Neill ◽  
R. Hall ◽  
D. Robertson
Keyword(s):  
Literature Review ◽  
Systematic Literature Review ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Modular Construction

Structural Integrity Assessment of Steam Generator Tubes Using a New EPRI Statistical Approach

2002 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos Alexandre de Jesus Miranda ◽  
Miguel Mattar Neto
Keyword(s):  
Steam Generator ◽  
Wall Thickness ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Structural Integrity ◽  
Tube Wall ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Inconel 600 ◽  
Integrity Assessment ◽  
Tube Wall Thickness ◽  
Uniform Tube

A fundamental step in tube plugging management of a Steam Generator (SG), in a Nuclear Power Plant (NPP), is the tube structural integrity evaluation. The degradation of SG tubes may be considered one of the most serious problems found in PWRs operation, mainly when the tube material is the Inconel 600. The first repair criterion was based on the degradation mode where a uniform tube wall thickness corrosion thinning occurred. Thus, a requirement of a maximum depth of 40% of the tube wall thickness was imposed for any type of tube damage. A new approach considers different defects arising from different degradation modes, which comes from the in-service inspections (NDE) and how to consider the involved uncertainties. It is based on experimental results, using statistics to consider the involved uncertainties, to assess structural limits of PWR SG tubes. In any case, the obtained results, critical defect dimensions, are within the regulatory limits. In this paper this new approach will be discussed and it will be applied to two cases (two defects) using typical data of SG tubes of one Westinghouse NPP. The obtained results are compared with ‘historical’ approaches and some comments are addressed from the results and their comparison.

Proposed License Structure of Small Modular Reactor in China

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zheng Hua ◽  
Wei Shuhong
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Modular Design ◽  
Nuclear Regulatory Commission ◽  
Light Water Reactor ◽  
Research Progress ◽  
Structure Characteristics ◽  
Common Structure ◽  
Small Modular Reactor ◽  
Regulatory Commission ◽  
Design Construction

Small Modular Reactor (SMR) is getting more and more attention due to its safety and multi-purpose application. License structure is an important issue for SMR licensing. Modular design, construction and operation, shared or common structure, system and components (SSC) challenge existing large light water reactor license structure. Existing nuclear power plant license structure, characteristics of SMR and its effect on license structure, and research progress of U.S Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) are analyzed, SMR license structure in China are proposed, which can be used as a reference for SMR R&D, design and regulation.

Study on Supervision Mode of Floating Nuclear Power Plant With Small Modular Reactor

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lei Wan ◽  
Guiyong Li ◽  
Min Rui ◽  
Yongkang Liu ◽  
Jue Yang
Keyword(s):  
Power Plant ◽  
Nuclear Power Plant ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Government Regulation ◽  
Mutual Recognition ◽  
Nuclear Safety ◽  
Small Modular Reactor ◽  
License Application ◽  
Mutual Recognition Agreement ◽  
Nuclear Installation

A floating nuclear power plant (FNPP) with small modular reactor (SMR) is a combination of a civilian nuclear infrastructure and an offshore installation, which is defined as a floating nuclear facility. The article draws the lessons from studying of the engineer combination like Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) under the regulation of several government departments. It puts forward recommendations for license application and government regulation as follows in consideration with current license application for nuclear power plant and ship survey. A FNPP shall follow the requirements of construction, fueling and operation for civil nuclear installation combined with ship survey. Application is submitted to nuclear safety regulator for construction permit, while the design drawings shall be submitted to department of ship survey which checks the drawings whether meet the requirements of ship survey, considering some nuclear safety needs. The result of ship survey shall be represented in the safety analysis reports. The construction and important devices manufacturing shall be under the supervision of nuclear installation regulators and ship survey departments. In conclusion, National Nuclear Safety Administration (NNSA) and Maritime Safety Administration of the People’s Republic of China (MSA) shall establish united supervisory system for SMR on sea in China. It is suggested that NNSA is in charge of the overall safety of a FNPP, while MSA is responsible of the ship survey. The operator shall undertake obligation of a FNPP and evaluate the ship cooperating with experienced agency. It is suggested that government departments build the mutual recognition agreement of safety review. It is better to solve the vague questions by coordination.

scholarly journals Thermo-hydraulic Simulation of AP1000 Nuclear Reactor Fuel Assembly

2021 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 60-71
Author(s):  
Leonardo Acosta Martínez ◽  
Carlos Rafael García Hernández ◽  
Jesus Rosales García ◽  
Annie Ortiz Puentes
Keyword(s):  
Fuel Assembly ◽  
Power Distribution ◽  
Capital Investment ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Nuclear Reactor ◽  
Geometric Model ◽  
Modular Construction ◽  
Construction Time ◽  
Hydraulic Simulation ◽  
In Series

One of the challenges of future nuclear power is the development of safer and more efficient nuclear reactor designs. The AP1000 reactor based on the PWR concept of generation III + has several advantages, which can be summarized as: a modular construction, which facilitates its manufacture in series reducing the total construction time, simplification of the different systems, reduction of the initial capital investment and improvement of safety through the implementation of passive emergency systems. Being a novel design it is important to study the thermohydraulic behavior of the core applying the most modern tools. To determine the thermohydraulic behavior of a typical AP1000 fuel assembly, a computational model based on CFD was developed. A coupled neutronic-thermohydraulic calculation was performed, allowing to obtain the axial power distribution in the typical fuel assembly. The geometric model built used the certified dimensions for this type of installation that appear in the corresponding manuals. The thermohydraulic study used the CFD-based program ANSYS-CFX, considering an eighth of the fuel assembly. The neutronic calculation was performed with the program MCNPX version 2.6e. The work shows the results that illustrate the behavior of the temperature and the heat transfer in different zones of the fuel assembly. The results obtained agree with the data reported in the literature, which allowed the verification of the consistency of the developed model.

scholarly journals Application of Explosion-Proof RFID Technology in Nuclear Power Plants

2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 127-132
Author(s):  
Namjin Cho ◽  
Dongsu Im ◽  
Jungdon Kwon ◽  
Teayeon Cho ◽  
Junglim Lee
Keyword(s):  
Radio Frequency ◽  
Radio Frequency Identification ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Power Plants ◽  
Nuclear Power Plants ◽  
Ignition Source ◽  
Rfid Technology ◽  
Nuclear Plants ◽  
Frequency Identification

Nuclear power plants store and use flammable gases and liquids and consequently risk explosions. Therefore, nuclear plants employ explosion-proof equipment; however, this equipment is not always sufficiently maintained. This lack of maintenance can affect the safety-related equipment intended to shut down the reactor, because the explosion-proof equipment itself can act as an ignition source. Radio-frequency identification (RFID) technology should be explored as a tool to improve both the convenience and efficiency of maintenance. We analyzed and compared explosion-proof RFID technology that can be used in nuclear power plants.

An Advanced Method for Evaluating Risk From Seismically-Induced Internal Fires and Floods

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul J. Amico ◽  
Pierre Macheret ◽  
Robert P. Kassawara
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Tohoku Earthquake ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Advanced Method ◽  
Plant Safety ◽  
Nuclear Plants ◽  
Significant Interest ◽  
Realistic Representation ◽  
Nuclear Power Plant Safety ◽  
Technical Guidance

It has been traditional in assessment of nuclear power plant safety that both deterministic safety analyses and probabilistic safety analyses treat the potential effects of various hazards individually. That is, the safety implications of internal events (e.g., randomly occurring transients and LOCAs), internal hazards (e.g., internal fire and flood), and external hazards (e.g., earthquakes, tornados) are treated as independent occurrences. With the occurrence of the Great Tohoku earthquake and the effects observed at nuclear plants in Japan, it was realized that this approach failed to provide a realistic representation of risk, and now there is a significant interest in correlated hazards. As a result, EPRI embarked on the development of an improved methodology focusing on seismically-induced internal fires and internal floods. All the technical work on the methodology has been completed and draft technical guidance developed. This guidance has been provided to some plants that are interested in piloting the methodology. As of the date of paper submittal, two pilots are underway and three more are under consideration. Upon completion of the pilots, the methodology will be updated to incorporate the lessons-learned and published.

Integration Options for Nuclear Steam Cycle Using Liquid Air Energy Storage

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jin Young Heo ◽  
Won Woong Lee ◽  
Jung Hwan Park ◽  
Jeong Ik Lee
Keyword(s):  
Energy Storage ◽  
Steam Turbine ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Storage Systems ◽  
Energy Transition ◽  
Packed Bed ◽  
Round Trip ◽  
Energy Storage Systems ◽  
Nuclear Plants ◽  
Steam Cycle

Abstract To facilitate the energy transition, the conventional baseload nuclear power must be equipped with flexibility. By integrating grid-scale energy storage systems to the existing nuclear plants, they can curtail their load to avoid surplus generation. Liquid air energy storage (LAES) has been steadily investigated for their advantages, and this paper suggests an integrated layout using mechanical drive steam turbine and packed bed energy storage systems. Possible options for integration of LAES to the existing nuclear steam cycle are considered. The performance of packed bed storage systems is analyzed using transient modeling, and the results are fed into the overall cycle design using an in-house code. The results of the analysis suggests that the concept can reach up to 45.7–59.8% in round-trip efficiency, under much simplified cycle layout than the reference LAES layouts.

The organisation & the costs of the decommissioning nuclear plants in the UK

2009 ◽  
pp. 63-82
Author(s):  
Steve Thomas
Keyword(s):  
Key Words ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Nuclear Fuels ◽  
Nuclear Facilities ◽  
Nuclear Decommissioning ◽  
Nuclear Plants ◽  
New Public ◽  
Public Body ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Jel Classifications

- UK electricity consumers have paid provisions for decommissioning since before 1980 but by 2002, there were still negligible funds available to pay for decommissioning civil nuclear facilities. By then, the two major UK nuclear companies, British Energy and British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL), were both effectively bankrupt. This paper examines: the pre-2002 provisions for decommissioning and how they were lost; the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, a new public body which took over ownership of BNFL's facilities including the duty to manage their decommissioning and how it expects to carry out and fund decommissioning of its sites; how the re-launched British Energy will contribute to decommissioning its eight plants; and government plans for collecting decommissioning provisions for any new plants.JEL classifications: L50, L38, H23, H44, L71Key words: Nuclear power, decommissioning cost, funding and polluter pays.

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