Jovial Monk wrote on Aug 8^th, 2017 at 5:02pm:



Jovial,
70 atmospheres of pressure is very dangerous.

You know something -
I never heard about those extreme pressures until I did a bit of study on it.
It's not something they tell you on TV shows.

Everyone of those nuclear reactors is like a bomb ready to explode.
It's a pressure cooker - that's cooking up Uranium fuel rods that
have to be expertly controlled so that the whole thing
doesn't melt down & explode.

If the cooling fails as at Chernobyl & Fukushima - there's a meltdown
& a gigantic explosion from all that pressure sends
radioactive clouds of material all around the Earth.

Uranium reactors should never have been made after Thorium was proven by 1969 in the USA.

Thorium is a proven technology & it's safe -
no pressure - it's walk away safe even if the worst happens.

Jovial,
read if you can?


Today, reactors derived from designs originally developed for propelling submarines and large naval ships generate about 85% of the world's nuclear electricity. The main design is the pressurised water reactor (PWR) which has water at over 300°C under pressure in its primary cooling/heat transfer circuit, and generates steam in a secondary circuit. The less numerous boiling water reactor (BWR) makes steam in the primary circuit above the reactor core, at similar temperatures and pressure. Both types use water as both coolant and moderator, to slow neutrons. Since water normally boils at 100°C, they have robust steel pressure vessels or tubes to enable the higher operating temperature. (Another type uses heavy water, with deuterium atoms, as moderator. Hence the term ‘light water’ is used to differentiate.)


http://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/nuclear-fuel-cycle/nuclear-powe...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pressurized_water_reactor

Coolant

Light water is used as the primary coolant in a PWR. Water enters through the bottom of the reactor's core at about 548 K (275 °C; 527 °F) and is heated as it flows upwards through the reactor core to a temperature of about 588 K (315 °C; 599 °F). The water remains liquid despite the high temperature due to the high pressure in the primary coolant loop, usually around 155 bar (15.5 MPa 153 atm, 2,250 psi). In water, the critical point occurs at around 647 K (374 °C; 705 °F) and 22.064 MPa (3200 psi or 218 atm).[7]

Jovial is like an empty kettle that makes the most noise.

He didn't even know that nuclear reactors work at high pressure
yet he started a thread on nuclear power.

What else doesn't he know?

Neutron embrittlement?