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NRC looks to leverage previous approvals for large LWRs
During this time of resurging interest in nuclear power, many conversations have centered on one fundamental problem: Electricity is needed now, but nuclear projects (in recent decades) have taken many years to get permitted and built.
In the past few years, a bevy of new strategies have been pursued to fix this problem. Workforce programs that seek to laterally transition skilled people from other industries, plans to reuse the transmission infrastructure at shuttered coal sites, efforts to restart plants like Palisades or Duane Arnold, new reactor designs that build on the legacy of research done in the early days of atomic power—all of these plans share a common throughline: leveraging work already done instead of starting over from square one to get new plants designed and built.
Youho Lee, Thomas J. McKrell, Chao Yue, Mujid S. Kazimi
Nuclear Technology | Volume 183 | Number 2 | August 2013 | Pages 210-227
Technical Paper | Fuel Cycle and Management/Materials for Nuclear Systems | doi.org/10.13182/NT12-122
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
An experimental assessment was conducted of the silicon carbide (SiC) cladding oxidation rate in steam under conditions that are representative of loss-of-coolant accidents in light water reactors (LWRs). SiC oxidation tests were performed with monolithic alpha-phase tubular samples at atmospheric pressure for steam temperatures of 1140°C and 1500°C and a Reynolds number range of 40 to 330. Linear weight loss of SiC samples due to boundary layer controlled reaction of silica scale (SiO2 volatilization) was experimentally observed. The weight loss rate increased with increasing steam flow rate and temperature. Over the range of test conditions, SiC oxidation rates were shown to be about three orders of magnitude lower than the oxidation rates of Zircaloy-4. This underlines a weaker interplay between oxidation and mechanical property degradation in comparison with Zircaloy. SiC volatilization correlations for developing laminar flow in a vertical channel were formulated for LWR accident modeling.
