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NRC approves TerraPower construction permit
Today, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced that it has approved TerraPower’s construction permit application for Kemmerer Unit 1, the company’s first deployment of Natrium, its flagship sodium fast reactor.
This approval is a significant milestone on three fronts. For TerraPower, it represents another step forward in demonstrating its technology. For the Department of Energy, it reflects progress (despite delays) for the Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program (ARDP). For the NRC, it is the first approval granted to a commercial reactor in nearly a decade—and the first approval of a commercial non–light water reactor in more than 40 years.
Gabriel F. Cuevas Vivas, Yassin A. Hassan
Nuclear Technology | Volume 127 | Number 3 | September 1999 | Pages 287-300
Technical Paper | Reactor Safety | doi.org/10.13182/NT99-A3002
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
An analysis of the simplified boiling water reactor (SBWR) is carried out using the reactor analysis computer program RAMONA-4B in an operational transient scenario, a turbine trip with failure of all the bypass valves. The SBWR model represents the vessel's internal components, such as flow areas, diameters, and volumes. The one-quarter-core neutron parameters are calculated with the CASMO-3 transport theory lattice physics computer program. The three-dimensional representation of the reactor core uses some standard fuel design parameters, such as a wide central water rod, 8 x 8 lattice, gadolinium rods, etc. The thermal-hydraulic equations are solved with the RAMONA-4B computer program in a closed loop inside the reactor vessel and in 184 parallel channels (including bypass) in the core.Finally, the two-phase coolant and neutronic parameters are calculated in steady state and during the turbine trip transient. The results obtained compare favorably with the standard safety analysis report data.