| Version | Summary | Created by | Modification | Content Size | Created at | Operation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sirius Huang | -- | 1624 | 2022-11-11 01:37:40 |
Advanced nuclear is an emerging area of the energy industry focused on designing and commercializing next generation reactors for nuclear energy production. Encompassing more comprehensive and radical technological innovations and design advancements, these innovations aim to dramatically improve performance and eliminate known problems associated with the existing generation nuclear reactors (Gen I and Gen II) currently in use around the world. The earliest Gen I and Gen II nuclear reactors built utilized the light-water reactor design in one of three variants: the pressurized water reactor (PWR), the boiling water reactor (BWR), and the supercritical water reactor (SCWR). The use of the light-water design (i.e. using regular water, H2O and not heavy water, 2H2O) as both its coolant and neutron moderator but needing a plentiful supply) in all commercial reactors was a trade-off that enabled the industry to leverage the purchasing clout of Admiral Hyman G. Rickover, who was keen on procuring nuclear-powered submarines for the Navy, to grow quickly. The choice, however, imposed a riskier design that many argued was not optimized for terrestrial energy, bringing both competitive advantages as well as fateful disadvantages to the initial development and subsequent growth of the commercial nuclear power fleet. Despite operating to the military's exacting specifications and winning praise and massive contracts from government buyers, the industry quickly earned the distrust of the public. (See the Anti-nuclear movement.) Generation III reactors contain yet further incremental refinements to aspects of Generation II nuclear reactor designs but were not very popular. Improvements were developed for fuel technology, thermal efficiency, to safety systems to reduce maintenance and capital costs. The first Generation III reactor was Kashiwazaki 6 (an ABWR) in 1996 but the declining support for the underlying Generation II light-water design, caused relatively few third generation reactors to be built. Generation IV designs are the first generation where innovator in Advanced Nuclear technologies are exploring paradigm shifts in methodologies. Gen IV projects encompass not just innovative nuclear fission concepts, like the Molten salt reactor, Liquid Metal Fast Breeder Reactors, and High temperature gas cooled reactors, but also Fusion power and even Low Energy Nuclear Reactors (LENR), which generate heat through a series of controlled chemical reactions that then cause a nuclear bond to shift, which results in heat output. Gen IV is still in development as of 2017, and are not expected to start entering commercial operation until after 2020. Some of the different reactor design ideas being explored and developed for Advanced nuclear reactors, now thought of as Generation IV reactors (Gen IV) today were actually first conceived within the National Labs back in the 1960s. Several of these concepts, including Alvin M. Weinberg's Molten salt reactor (MSR) developed at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), even had the benefit of being prototyped and tested over a period of time. Weinberg's MSR became the first reactor to run on Uranium 233 in 1968 and logged more than 13,000 hours at "full power" before being shut down in 1969. Today, the concept of using a molten salt brew that acts both as the fuel and the "containment" of the reaction by using the ionic bonds of the salt to capture and contain the heat generated from the nuclear reaction, thereby dispensing with the need for expensive containment structures and eliminating much of risk and cost, remains of keen interest to those exploring Advanced nuclear technologies.