Title:

The Case for the Fusion-Fission Hybrid---Enabling Sustainable Nuclear Power

Speaker:

Dr. Weston M. Stacey

Affiliation:

NRE/MP Programs

When:

Thursday, April 1, 2010 at 11:00:00 AM   Add to Calendar

Where:

Boggs Building, Room 3-47, 3rd FL

Host:

Farzad Rahnema
farzad@gatech.edu
404.894.3731

Abstract

A fission-fusion hybrid (FFH) is a sub-critical nuclear fission reactor with a fusion neutron source. The applications envisioned for FFHs are all related to closing the nuclear fuel cycle either as i) fast burner reactors that will fission the transuranics (TRU) in spent nuclear fuel (SNF) discharged from Light Water Reactors (LWRs) to reduce the requirement for geological high-level waste (HLW) repositories, or as fast breeder reactors that will transmute fertile 238U into fissile 239Pu that can be used as fuel, or as self-sustaining fast reactors that will achieve both of these objectives. The motivation for sub-critical, rather than critical, operation of the fast burner, breeder or sustainer fission reactor is to expand their design, operating and fuel cycle space to better enable the closing of the nuclear fuel cycle. For example, a FFH could readily achieve deep fuel burnup to the clad radiation damage limit by adjusting the neutron source strength without the constraint of maintaining a critical neutron chain reaction. It also has been argued that sub-critical operation would provide sufficient additional reactivity safety margin to allow 100 % TRU-fueled fast burner reactors, with the result of increasing the support ratio of LWRs to FFH fast burner reactors relative to the support ratio with critical fast reactors. The SABR FFH concept that has been developed at Georgia Tech will be described. SABR is based on the leading Na-cooled, metal fuel, fast reactor technology and on the leading tokamak fusion technology that will be demonstrated in ITER.

Biography

Weston M. Stacey is Callaway Regents’ Professor of Nuclear Engineering at Georgia Tech. His experience includes the physics theory and engineering design of both fission and fusion reactors.

Notes

Refreshments will be served.