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A concept design of supercritical CO 2 cooled SMR operating at isolated microgrid region
Author(s) -
Kim Seong Gu,
Yu Hwanyeal,
Moon Jangsik,
Baik Seungjoon,
Kim Yonghee,
Jeong Yong Hoon,
Lee Jeong Ik
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
international journal of energy research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.808
H-Index - 95
eISSN - 1099-114X
pISSN - 0363-907X
DOI - 10.1002/er.3633
Subject(s) - brayton cycle , nuclear engineering , supercritical fluid , nuclear reactor core , process engineering , modular design , electricity generation , engineering , auxiliary power unit , heat exchanger , waste management , power (physics) , environmental science , mechanical engineering , automotive engineering , electrical engineering , computer science , chemistry , physics , organic chemistry , quantum mechanics , voltage , operating system
Summary Most of the small modular reactor (SMR) concepts developed in the past have compact size and a longer life reactor core than the conventional nuclear power plants. However, these concepts have not achieved the full modularization including power conversion system. This study suggests an innovative concept of a reactor cooled by supercritical state carbon dioxide (S‐CO 2 ). A reactor core with uranium carbide fuel controlled by drum type control rods was designed. The core has long life (20 years) without refueling or reshuffling as well as inherent safety features. The reactor can be used as a distributed power source and replace outdated fossil fuel power plants for small cities. Moreover, the authors propose the S‐CO 2 Brayton cycle as a power conversion system to achieve compact and lightweight module. Because of compact core and power conversion system, the entire system can be contained in a single module. The target of the system is to be able to transport a single core and power conversion system module via ground transportation. In order to meet this target, single module's total weight is minimized in the order of 100 tons. The external size of a module is less than 7 m in length and 4 m in diameter. It produces 12MWe electricity from 36MWt reactor core. The S‐CO 2 Brayton cycle was optimized, and the cycle components such as turbomachineries and heat exchangers were designed preliminarily to observe the potential to maximize the performance while minimizing the weight. Moreover, a dry air‐cooling option to reject waste heat for inland installation was selected for the suggested nuclear system. A concept of passive decay heat removal system was developed, and its performance was examined to determine the required heat removal capacity of the system to assure the system's safety under various anticipated accidents. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.