Nuclear Design 2020

This project is conceived to improve your knowledge

in fundamentals of nuclear reactor design,

as taught in the four chapters studied in class:

1) classification attempt

2) water-moderated reactors

3) graphite-moderated reactors

4) reactors with reduced moderation,

by working on recent and accessible research articles.

Additional information can be easily found on the web

(for instance on this site: https://www.nuclear-power.net).

For more details on this year's subject,

extra documents are given at the bottom of this page

(one per article) together with this common introduction.

KRUSTY (1 kW_e) and JANUS (1 MW_e)

small reactors for space electric propulsion

Nuclear Design, How To ?

Teacher : Alexis Nuttin

• 4 subjects = 4 parts (defined below) of the two selected articles (pdf files at the bottom of this page)

• Understanding and synthesis work in group

  • During our brainstorming sessions and outside

  • Questions about precise issues to ask by e-mail

• Send documents by e-mail before October 29

  • Slides in pdf, w/o animation (4-6 max. per person)

  • Abstract of about 500 words (2 pages max.)

• Pedagogic & synthetic presentation ("best way to learn is to teach")

  • 10-minute presentation per group (1/4h max.)

  • 10-minute Q&A session (from the other groups)

KRUSTY and JANUS, two small space reactors (November 2)

article 1 : D. Poston et al. (LANL), KRUSTY Reactor Design (Nucl. Tech. 206, 2020)

KRUSTY experiment described by his responsible D. Poston (from 04:00, until 25:00)

article 1, part a (until VIII.A, included) : Design issues and goals, Simulation tools, Reactor description

Alan, Grégoire, Ana

article 1, part b (from VIII.B) : Reactor components (heat pipes, reflector, ...), Design calculations

Carlos, Francesco, Mattia

article 2 : A. Peakman and R. Gregg (NNL), The challenges of gas-cooled reactor technology for space propulsion and the development of the JANUS space reactor concept (Prog. Nucl. Energy 125, 2020)

article 2, part a (1. and 2.) : Introduction, Method

Justice, Sahil, Wolf

article 2, part b (3., 4. and 5.) : Uprating the nominal OPUS design, Future work, Conclusions

Noor, Oscar