Development of control technology for the HTGR hydrogen production system

Nishihara, Tetsuo ; Inagaki, Yoshiyuki

HTGR hydrogen production system has potential possibility to provide hydrogen without CO emission. Key technology for developing this system is to establish the control technology for preventing propagation of thermal turbulence from the hydrogen production system to the HTGR. Japan Atomic Energy Research Institute (JAERI) has planed a demonstration test of hydrogen production using an HTGR named high temperature engineering test reactor (HTTR) to develop the control technology. Thermal load absorber concept using the steam generator located downstream of the chemical reactor is proposed to mitigate the variation of outlet helium temperature of the chemical reactor. This concept leads to the stable controllability and enables to operate the HTGR and the hydrogen production plant independently. Plant simulation analyses are carried out to verify the performance of this concept.