Kairos and TVA partner to build demonstration pebble
The US Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and Kairos Power have announced a new agreement to build Kairos' Hermes low-power demonstration molten-salt cooled, pebble-bed reactor at the East Tennessee Technology Park (ETTP) in Oak Ridge, Tennessee.
With the pressures of climate change policies and official opposition to fossil fuels in the US, nuclear power is looking increasingly attractive, but it isn't a matter of building more of the huge pressurized water reactors that have dominated the American nuclear industry since the 1950s. Currently, agencies like the TVA, which generates 40 percent of US nuclear power, are more interested in advanced and unorthodox plant designs, like small modular reactors and pebble-bed reactors like Hermes.
In a conventional reactor, the fuel is in the form of pellets of enriched uranium or plutonium set inside of fuel rods placed in a geometric array interspersed with control rods to form the core of the reactor that is immersed in water. The fuel rods sit close enough together to start the nuclear reaction, the water moderates or slows down the neutrons spewed by the splitting atoms to maintain the reaction, and the control rods keep the reaction from going out of control and causing a meltdown.
In a pebble-bed reactor, the rods are replaced with tennis-ball-sized spheres made of layers of enriched nuclear fuel and graphite, which acts as the moderator, and clad in ceramic. Thousands of these spheres or pebbles are poured inside the reactor, where they set off and sustain the nuclear reaction at high temperatures without the need for control rods. In most pebble-bed reactors, the core is usually cooled by a gas like helium, nitrogen, or carbon dioxide. Though the concept of the pebble-bed reactor has been around since 1947, and the principle is simple and self-regulating, there have been a number of technical hurdles to overcome, so the reactors that have been built have all been research or prototype designs, but no fully operating plants have been constructed.
According to Kairos, Hermes is a demonstrator reactor for developing the technologies that will go into advanced future reactors for actual service. Instead of gas, it uses molten fluoride salts. Where water has a temperature range of 100 °C (180 °F), from melting to boiling, and can suddenly flash into steam under the right conditions, fluoride salts have a range of over 1,000 °C (1.800 °F), which allows them to transfer huge amounts of heat at ordinary pressures. In addition, they're chemically stable, can operate without bulky and expensive high-pressure containment structures, and, in the event of a reactor failure, they can keep the core cool by natural circulation.
When up and running, Hermes will put out 140 MWE at an operating temperature of 585 °C (1,085 °F) using pebbles containing fuel enriched to 19.75 percent.
"We look forward to collaborating with TVA, and drawing upon the well-versed knowledge and expertise of their team," says Mike Laufer, Co-Founder and CEO of Kairos Power. "Kairos Power and TVA have a shared commitment to improving people’s quality of life and pursuing innovation through advanced nuclear that provides reliable, clean energy for the future."
Source: Kairos Power
(责任编辑:行业动态)
- SpaceX Polaris Dawn mission: How to watch the launch
- Microwave technique recovers 87% of batteries' lithium in 15 minutes
- Trump trials: Jack Smith is reportedly reconsidering his strategy.
- 3D Game Rendering 101
- Pakistan Cricket at crossroads after shock defeat at Pindi
- Apple's iPhone 17 will come with a huge RAM upgrade, report claims
- 10 Places to Get to Know Paul Bunyan
- Our galaxy might crash into Andromeda. What would happen to Earth?
- Essential Apps to Install on your Windows PC or Mac
- 雅安市第四人民医院:工娱治疗让患者康复之路充满希望
- SCOTUS: The courts implementing Project 2025, without Trump.
- 10 Places to Get to Know Paul Bunyan
- NASA rover snaps photo of its most daunting challenge yet
-
18 Places for Epic Outdoor Adventure Across Colorado
The Centennial State is an outdoorsy dream, with hiking, mountain-biking, skiing, kayaking, birding ...[详细] -
Number Representations in Computer Hardware
Welcome to arguably the most fundamental component of computer design: how numbers are represented i ...[详细] -
Travel Back in Time and Uncover Old
Oozing with Old-World charm, Boston’s Beacon Hill is a time-traveler’s dream. Stay in a hotel that o ...[详细] -
Why Kamala Harris triggers Donald Trump so intensely.
As Kamala Harris spoke on the last night of the Democratic National Convention, Donald Trump took to ...[详细] -
The local version of Project 2025 is already causing devastation.
Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation’s toxic playbook for a second Trump administration, has so inf ...[详细] -
Ocean Energy has deployed its 826-tonne wave energy converter buoy OE-35 at the US Navy's Wave Energ ...[详细]
-
Travel Back in Time and Uncover Old
Oozing with Old-World charm, Boston’s Beacon Hill is a time-traveler’s dream. Stay in a hotel that o ...[详细] -
Understanding Relational vs. Non
Relational databases and non-relational databases primarily differ in the types of data they store a ...[详细] -
Essential Apps to Install on your Windows PC or Mac
You just bought a new laptop, built a new desktop PC, or are simply clean installing on a new solid ...[详细] -
Supercritical geothermal power: Limitless promise or impossible dream?
Supercritical geothermal power holds the promise of meeting humanity's energy needs for millions of ...[详细]
Microwave technique recovers 87% of batteries' lithium in 15 minutes
Speeding space object triggered a warning. It wasn't an asteroid.
- Campbell highlights Washington Declaration amid security concerns over Putin
- [Online Predators] Deepfake pornography haunts S. Korea
- The OLED Burn
- Who is the Dark Wizard in 'The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power' Season 2?
- 18 Slightly Submerged Architectural Wonders
- 抖音超600万次传播量!广东省农事运动会乡村直播大赛火出圈
- What to expect from Apple's September event: iPhone 16, Apple Watch 10, and more