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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.
Taisuke Yonomoto, Masaya Kondo, Yutaka Kukita, L. Scott Ghan,, Richard R. Schultz
Nuclear Technology | Volume 119 | Number 2 | August 1997 | Pages 112-122
Technical Paper | Nuclear Reactor Safety | doi.org/10.13182/NT97-A35380
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Integral experiments simulating small-break loss-of-coolant accidents in the Westinghouse AP600 reactor are conducted using the ROSA-V large-scale test facility. These experiments show that the core makeup tank (CMT) behavior can be divided into two phases: the natural-circulation and the drain phases. The natural-circulation phase between the CMT and the rest of the primary is established immediately after the opening of the valve in the discharge line. The hot water from the primary, through the pressure balance line (PBL), accumulates in the top of the CMT, forming a clear thermal stratification above the cold initial inventory of the CMT. The drain phase is initiated by flashing in the CMT for break diameters ≤1 in. and by a gaseous flow from the primary for break diameters ≥2 in. Interactions between the CMT and the other safety components are observed: The CMT discharge rate is decreased by accumulator injection and is increased by actuation of the automatic depressurization system. When the PBL is empty of liquid, the CMT drain rate is approximately given by the free gravitational drain rate, irrespective of the flow direction in the PBL.