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LLNL, Ampera partner to develop thorium-based TRISO fuel
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has formed a strategic partnership with Ampera to develop the company’s nuclear fuel concept through a project named THUNDER, for Thorium Unimodal Droplet Ejection for Reactors.
The focus of THUNDER is fabricating TRISO made with kernels of thorium rather than the usual uranium. LLNL and Ampera will evaluate and optimize liquid metal–jetting technology to produce highly uniform, spherical kernels of thorium-232 for later processing into TRISO fuel.
Chih Wu
Nuclear Technology | Volume 84 | Number 2 | February 1989 | Pages 123-127
Technical Paper | Fission Reactor | doi.org/10.13182/NT89-A34182
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The power output of a simple finite-time Brayton closed cycle for an indirect gas-cooled nuclear power plant is analyzed. The system adopted is a reversible Brayton cycle coupled to a reactor (heat source) and a cooling fluid (heat sink) by heat transfer. Mathematical expression is derived for the power output of the nuclear power plant, and the maximum power output is found. The maximum bound provides a basis for designing a real indirect gas nuclear power plant and for a performance comparison with existing power plants.