SMR Safety

Is it safe?

The major risk of nuclear plants is radiation. NCR states that an operating nuclear power plant produces small amounts of radioactive gases and liquids, as well as small amounts of direct radiation. Within 50 miles of a big nuclear power plant, an average person would receive an average radiation dose of about 0.01 millirem per year. SMRs radiation would be much lower, since they use fewer fuel than big plants.

In the United States, a person receives an exposure of 300 millirem per year from natural background sources of radiation.

The Emergency Planning Zone (EPZ) is the area surrounding the nuclear power plant within which special considerations and management practices are pre-planned and exercised in case of emergency. We have developed a 50-mile radius EPZ based on the following factors:

Population areas surrounding the plantO
Operating features of the SMR
Geographical aspects of the selected location

What about the waste?

This SMR has a used fuel pool that allows for storage of up to 10 years of used fuel, as well as temporary storage for new fuel assemblies.

The spent fuel pool is made of stainless steel-lined concrete, adjacent to the reactor pool and contains four times the volume of cooling water than current designs. Its underground location reduces the potential for cooling water loss. A cleaning system reduces the accumulation of contaminants.

After removal from the reactor core, spent fuel assemblies are placed in dedicated spent fuel storage racks in the underground spent fuel pool. Our facilities are designed to facilitate the transfer of the spent fuel to a dry barrel storage system after 5 years, when the thermal load on the spent fuel assemblies is significantly reduced. The layout of the plant site includes an allocation of adequate space for dry storage of all used fuel over the 60 year life of the plant.

In case of contingencies, the pool provides approximately 3 months of passive cooling of the spent fuel assemblies should a loss of all electrical power occur without the need for additional water.

Can’t it explode?

A nuclear reactor can never explode like an atomic bomb. Explosions, if any, could only occur if the core reactor suffered a meltdown. A meltdown means that due to lack of coolant, or too much fission, the core becomes so hot that it melts. Water is turned to steam, the fuel rods melt and then react with the steam, causing an explosion.

SMRs are built in a way that even if they lose all off-site power, the reactor will safely automatically shut down and self-cool, indefinitely with no operator action and no additional water, according to Nuscale.

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