TY - JOUR TI - High temperature ultra-small modular reactor: Pre-conceptual design AU - Kaffezakis, Naiki AU - Terlizzi, Stefano AU - Smith, Corey AU - Erickson, Anna S. AU - Yee, Shannon K. AU - Kotlyar, Dan T2 - Annals of Nuclear Energy AB - This paper describes the pre-conceptual design for a high temperature (>1300 °C), ultra-small (1–10 MWe) modular reactor with a high efficiency (>50%) thermophotovoltaic (TPV) power-block. The integration of the TPV is attractive for increased efficiency over the heat cycles of traditional nuclear power plants (NPP) and increased inherent safety from the elimination of a working fluid. Allowing for heat removal through radiative and passive convective cooling, the design must operate at low power densities. A preliminary sampling of the design space was performed using coupled thermal and neutronic analysis on a simplified model. This study shows the viability of the design and reveals the favorability of using uranium nitride fuel that allow the core to operate safely at approximately 1–2 W/cm3 within the desired temperature limits. Although preliminary, the depletion and economic analyses reveal an operational time on the order of ten thousand days and approximately 43% savings in NPP capital costs. DA - 2020/06/15/ PY - 2020 DO - 10.1016/j.anucene.2020.107311 DP - ScienceDirect VL - 141 SP - 107311 J2 - Annals of Nuclear Energy LA - en SN - 0306-4549 ST - High temperature ultra-small modular reactor UR - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306454920300098 Y2 - 2021/05/06/20:46:47 KW - Energy Conversion KW - Graphite moderated reactor KW - Nuclear KW - Serpent KW - Small modular reactor KW - Thermo-Photovoltaic KW - Thermophotovoltaics ER -