China plans to build a hybrid fusion fission reactor by 2030 but no real technical details

 http://nextbigfuture.com/

August 03, 2015

The South China Morning Post and Chinese media are reporting that China will build a new hybrid reactor that can burn nuclear waste via a combined fusion-fission method by 2030.

The proposed hybrid reactor will use nuclear fusion to burn u-238 and could in theory recycle the waste from traditional reactors into new fuel.

The project is being developed at the Chinese Academy of Engineering Physics in Sichuan, a top secret military research facility where China's nuclear weapons are developed.

The scheme was first reported by the Science and Technology Daily, a newspaper run by the official Ministry of Science and Technology.

At the core of the proposed hybrid plant is a fusion reactor which is powered by electric currents as strong as 60 trillion amps. The reactor will be blanketed by a fission shell stuffed with uranium-238.

Such a design has numerous advantages. The high-speed neutrons generated by fusion could split apart the u-238 atoms to generate fission, and the fission could generate lots of energy to help maintain the fusion, thus significantly reducing the amount of external energy input, and achieve the complete burning of nuclear fuel to avoid radioactive waste.

Professor Wang Hongwen, deputy director of the hybrid reactor project, said that the key components will be built and tested around 2020, with an experimental reactor due to be finished by 2030

The papers seem to assume that the fusion system would some version of a Tokamak fusion reactor.

There have been dozens if not hundreds of proposed fusion fission hybrid systems.

The Fusion system would generate neutrons which would help the fissioning of all of the uranium 238.

The concept dates to the 1950s, and was strongly advocated by Hans Bethe during the 1970s. At that time the first powerful fusion reactors were being built, but it would still be many years before they could be economically competitive. Hybrids were proposed as a way of greatly accelerating their market introduction, producing energy even before the fusion systems reached break-even. However, detailed studies of the economics of the systems suggested they could not compete with existing fission reactors. The idea was abandoned and lay dormant until the 2000s, when the continued delays in reaching break-even led to a brief revival around 2009, notably as the basis of the LIFE program.

LIFE, short for Laser Inertial Fusion Energy, was a fusion energy effort run at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) between 2008 and 2013. LIFE aimed to develop the technologies necessary to convert the laser-driven inertial confinement fusion (ICF) concept being developed in the National Ignition Facility (NIF) into a practical commercial power plant, a concept known generally as inertial fusion energy (IFE). LIFE used the same basic concepts as NIF, but aimed to lower costs using mass-produced fuel elements, simplified maintenance, and diode lasers with higher electrical efficiency. The failure of NIF to achieve ignition in 2012 led to the LIFE project being cancelled in 2013.

There was a molten salt variant of the LIFE hybrid system

Molten salt with dissolved uranium is being considered for the Laser Inertial Confinement Fusion Fission Energy (LIFE) fission blanket as a backup in case a solid-fuel version cannot meet the performance objectives, for example because of radiation damage of the solid materials. Molten salt is not damaged by radiation and therefore could likely achieve the desired high burnup (over 99%) of heavy atoms of 238U. A perceived disadvantage is the possibility that the circulating molten salt could lend itself to misuse (proliferation) by making separation of fissile material easier than for the solid-fuel case.

There was a 244 page review from a 2009 hybrid fusion fission conference.

 Any fusion (laser, magnetic, dense plasma focus etc...) can be made into a hybrid

Without a lot of technical details we have no idea what China is planning to do

Neutron economy

A key issue for the fusion-fission concept is the number and lifetime of the neutrons in the various processes, the so-called neutron economy.

In a pure fusion design, the neutrons are used for breeding tritium in a lithium blanket. Natural lithium consists of about 92% Li-7 and the rest is mostly Li-6. Li-7 requires neutron energies even higher than those released by fission, around 5 MeV, well within the range of energies provided by fusion. This reaction produces T, Helium-3, and another slow neutron. Li-6 can react with high or low energy neutrons, including those released by the Li-7 reaction. This means that a single fusion reaction can produce several tritiums, which is a requirement if the reactor is going to make up for natural decay and losses in the fusion processes.

When the lithium blanket is replaced, or supplanted, by fission fuel in the hybrid design, neutrons that do react with the fissile material are no longer available for tritium breeding. The new neutrons released from the fission reactions can be used for this purpose, but only in Li-6. One could process the lithium to increase the amount of Li-6 in the blanket, making up for these losses, but the downside to this process is that the Li-6 reaction only produces one tritium atom. Only the high-energy reaction between the fusion neutron and Li-7 can create more than one tritium, and this is essential for keeping the reactor running.

To address this issue, at least some of the fission neutrons must also be used for tritium breeding in Li-6. Every one that does is no longer available for fission, reducing the reactor output. This requires a very careful balance if one wants the reactor to be able to produce enough tritium to keep itself running, while also producing enough fission events to keep the fission side energy positive. If these cannot be accomplished simultaneously, there is no reason to build a hybrid. Even if this balance can be maintained, it might only occur at a level that is economically infeasible

Author: brian wang on 8/03/2015

China will start construction of a 600 MWe fourth generation nuclear reactor and it could be Terrapower traveling wave reactor 

Construction of the Xipu fast neutron reactor nuclear power demonstrative project in east China's Fujian province is designed to start at the end of 2017, China Business News quoted Xu Mi, an academician with Chinese Academy of Engineering, as saying.

The demonstrative nuclear power project, designed with 600,000kw (600 MWe) installed capacity, will be a fourth generation reactor designs.

The Shanghai newspaper speculated that this newest facility, because of its planned full scale size, will be the long anticipated joint commercial venture between China National Nuclear Corp. and TerraPower, a firm based on Bellevue, WA. Gates has been instrumental in funding the development of a type of fast reactor called a “traveling wave reactor” through TerraPower, a company he founded in 2008 and chairs. Gates has visited China at least three times in recent years for possible cooperation on nuclear power.

On his last trip to Beijing, which took place last February of this year, Gates met with Nur Bekri, a vice chair of China’s National Development and Reform Commission, and with China National Nuclear Corp chairman Sun Qin. China National Nuclear Corp is one of the country’s largest nuclear power company and a major Chinese partner of TerraPower. The two firms first announced an intent to cooperate on fast reactor designs in 2012.

The Chinese newspaper did not cite a confirmation statement from Terrapower about the Fujian pilot project.

Fast neutron reactors

China's research and development on fast neutron reactors started in 1964.

A 65 MWt sodium-cooled fast neutron reactor – the Chinese Experimental Fast Reactor (CEFR) – at the China Institute of Atomic Energy (CIAE) near Beijing, started up in July 2010.1 It was built by Russia's OKBM Afrikantov in collaboration with OKB Gidropress, NIKIET and Kurchatov Institute. It was grid connected at 40% power (8 MWe net) in July 2011, and ramped up to full 20 MWe power in December, then passed 'official' checks in October 2012. It has negative temperature, power reactivity and sodium void coefficients. Its fuel cycle is designed to use electrometallurgical reprocessing. It is reported to have high-enriched (65%) UO2 fuel.

The CDFR-1000, a 1000 MWe Chinese prototype fast reactor based on the CEFR, was envisaged with construction start in 2017 and commissioning 2023 as the next step in CIAE's program. This would be a three-loop 2500 MWt pool-type, use MOX fuel with average 66 GWd/t burn-up, run at 544°C, have breeding ratio 1.2, with 316 core fuel assemblies and 255 blanket ones, and a 40-year life. This is CIAE's 'project one' Chinese Demonstration Fast Reactor (CDFR). It is to have active and passive shutdown systems and passive decay heat removal. The reactor would use MOX fuel with average 66 GWd/t burn-up, run at 544°C, have breeding ratio 1.2, with 316 core fuel assemblies and 255 blanket ones. This could form the basis of the Chinese Commercial Fast Reactor (CCFR) by 2030, using MOX + actinide or metal + actinide fuel. MOX is seen only as an interim fuel, the target arrangement is metal fuel in closed cycle.

However, in October 2009, an agreement was signed by CIAE and China Nuclear Energy Industry Corporation (CNEIC) with Russia's Atomstroyexport to start pre-project and design works for a commercial nuclear power plant with two BN-800 reactorsc (see section on Sanming in the information page on Nuclear Power in China). These reactors are referred to by CIAE as 'project 2' Chinese Demonstration Fast Reactors (CDFRs), with construction originally to start in 2013 and commissioning 2018-19. In contrast to the intention in Russia, these would use ceramic MOX fuel pellets. The project was expected to lead to bilateral cooperation of fuel cycles for fast reactors. However, according to the Beloyarsk plant Director late in 2014, “The main objective of the BN-800 is [to provide] operating experience and technological solutions that will be applied to the BN-1200," and no further Russian BN-800 units are planned. The project is reported to have been suspended indefinitely, though this is unconfirmed.

The CIAE's CDFR-1000 is expected to be followed by a 1200 MWe China Demonstration Fast Breeder Reactor (CDFBR) by about 2028, conforming to Generation IV criteria. This will have U-Pu-Zr fuel with 120 GWd/t burn-up and breeding ratio of 1.5 or more, with minor actinide and long-lived fission product recycle.

PWR capacity in China is expected to level off at 200 GWe about 2040, and fast reactors progressively increase from 2020 to at least 200 GWe by 2050 and 1400 GWe by 2100.

CGN and Xiamen University are reported to be cooperating on R and D for the travelling-wave reactor (TWR). The Ministry of Science and Technology, with CNNC and SNPTC, are skeptical of it. (This is a fast reactor design using natural or depleted uranium packed inside hundreds of hexagonal pillars. In a 'wave' that moves through the core at only one centimetre per year, the U-238 is bred progressively into Pu-239, which is the actual fuel. However, this design has now radically changed to become a standing wave reactor with the fuel shuffled in the core.) In January 2013 a prototype TWR-P was being discussed as a TerraPower-SNERDI joint project, and in December 2013 a US Federal Register notice said that the USA had negotiated an agreement with China “that would facilitate the joint development of TWR technology”, including standing wave versions of it.

Background

IAEA review of fast reactors in 2015

In Russia, the BN-600 sodium-cooled fast reactor (SFR) has shown an impressive operational performance by reaching an 86% load factor last year, while the Russian light water reactor (LWR) fleet reaches 82% on average. The multipurpose sodium-cooled fast neutron research reactor (MBIR), to be built in Dimitrovgrad, obtained the construction license from the Russian government. The BN-800 SFR will be commissioned at the beginning of 2016.

In India, commissioning of the prototype fast breeder reactor (PFBR) at Kalpakkam is expected to start by the end of September 2015. The China experimental fast reactor (CEFR), which was connected to the grid in 2011, reached 100% power in December 2014. In France, the conceptual design phase for the advanced sodium technological reactor for industrial demonstration (ASTRID) is planned to be completed by the end of 2015. In addition, other participating countries reported promising and progressing activities in FR development.

IAEA 2013 update of innovative nuclear reactors