GTHTR300 cost reduction through design upgrade and cogeneration

Yan, X.; Sato, Hiroyuki; Kamiji, Yu; Imai, Yoshiyuki; Terada, Atsuhiko; Tachibana, Yukio; Kunitomi, Kazuhiko

Nuclear Engineering and Design, 306, p.215 - 220, 2016/09

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nucengdes.2016.02.023

The latest design upgrade has incorporated several major technological advances made in the past ten years to both reactor and balance of plant in GTHTR300. As described in this paper, these advances have enabled raising the design basis reactor core outlet temperature to 950C and increasing power generating efficiency by nearly 5% point. Further implementation of seawater desalination cogeneration is made through employing a newly-proposed multi-stage flash process. Through efficient waste heat recovery of the reactor gas turbine power conversion cycle, a large cost credit is obtained against the conventionally produced water prices. Together, the design upgrade and the cogeneration are shown to reduce the GTHTR300 cost of electricity to under 2.7 cent/kW h.