Re:South Africa aims to be global supplier of HTR fuel
by PaulHoule on Tuesday April 02, 2024 @11:33AM
(#39906921)
A nation in that condition can overcome. And what else is worth doing?
The challenge I see isn't that they can't mine uranium and make HTR fuel, but more that there is not much of a market for it at the moment. But the concept is still under development
which I'd summarize as "in the helium environment the pebbles experience friction that causes significant fuel damage" China and X-Energy seem to think they can solve it but it is also possible to develop prismatic fuel elements that won't slide past each other but will need disassembling the pile at refueling time.
The challenge I see isn't that they can't mine uranium and make HTR fuel, but more that there is not much of a market for it at the moment. But the concept is still under development
https://www.modernpowersystems.com/features/featurewhatever-...
and they have a dual reactor powerplant running in China
https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/China-s-demonstratio...
I am a little skeptical about the pebbles because of the problems they had in Germany
https://inis.iaea.org/search/search.aspx?orig_q=RN:39099096
which I'd summarize as "in the helium environment the pebbles experience friction that causes significant fuel damage" China and X-Energy seem to think they can solve it but it is also possible to develop prismatic fuel elements that won't slide past each other but will need disassembling the pile at refueling time.