Full Title PWR-based Multipurpose Reactor Plants Tech Area / Field

FIR-OTH: Fission Reactors / Other

Brief Description of Technology
Reactor plants (RPs) designed on the basis of low and medium power vessel-type pressurized water reactors are unified facilities, allowing them to be used as a part of heat- and electricity-generating plants. Such power sources are intended to supply heat and electricity to regions that have no centralized power sources. It is foreseen that the power units can also be used as a part of sea water desalination complexes.

The installed electric power is from 85 MW(e) to 640 MW(e), and the heat production is from 56 Gkal to 1030 Gkal per power unit. The service life is up to 60 years. The safety level of RPs with integral reactors and nuclear power stations in general is higher than that for existing PWR loop-type RPs and meets the highest domestic and international standards.

AST, ATETS, and VPBER RPs are well-proven types of PWR-type RPs and considerably differ from all PWR-type RPs that currently exist or are being designed in:
- enhanced safety;
- integral layout of the reactor, that is, all equipment (core, main heat exchangers, steam-gas pressurizer, etc.) are arranged in a common vessel;
- wide use of natural circulation (for AST- and ATETS-type PRs, all-mode natural circulation is used as well) in all circuits and systems;
- low levels of power rating;
- large water inventory in the reactor providing for reactor sluggishness;
- arrangement of all primary circuits and hence of all radioactive products in a common vessel;
- lowering of neutron fluence to a level at which the problem of vessel material radiation embrittlement during the RP life-time is practically eliminated;
- arrangement of the reactor vessel in a second guard vessel (GV) to keep the core flooded and to confine radioactivity in primary-circuit depressurization accidents;
- use of an independent cooling channel through a condenser-heat exchanger installed directly onto the reactor from which primary circuit heat is removed through a double wall by natural circulation into a water storage tank, into atmosphere, through a double wall, and then to atmosphere;
- use of a built-in reactor straight-tube steam generator (or heat exchanger for AST), which has a design analogous to ship steam generators whose reliability and high operating characteristics have been proven by long-time operation;
- self-actuating (by physical parameters) devices are used for actuating the safety systems;
- possibility of aggregate and modular (completely works-prefabricated) shipment of equipment for the site;
- a great scope of scientific research has been completed to substantiate the peculiarities of processes in integral PWRs, and a test facility featuring this type of 200-MW reactor is successfully operated;
- quality assurance for all life-cycle stages of RPs.

The project supervisor is RAS academician F. M. Mitenkov.

Legal Aspects
A number of items used in the projects have been patented in Russia (steam generator, pressure-actuated electric breaker, automatic protection device, etc.).

Special Facilities in Use and Their Specifications None.

Scientific Papers
“Nuclear Engineering and Design”, 1997.

Дата добавления: 2015-07-20