eVinci Micro Reactor

34 NuclearPlantJournal.com Nuclear Plant Journal, March-April 2019 eVinci™ Micro Reactor By Yasir Arafat, and Jurie Van Wyk, Westinghouse Electric Company LLC. Yasir Arafat Yasir Arafat is a Principal Engineer and technical lead of the eVinci™ Micro Reactor program for Westinghouse. With the co-lead, he shares responsibility for the overall technical authority of the project and aligns work between design, testing, licensing and manufacturing, and the development and commercialization program. Mr. Arafat’s eight years of nuclear industry experience with Westinghouse have been focused on nuclear systems design, including for the AP1000® Nuclear Power Plant, Westinghouse Small Modular Reactor and fusion power plant design. Mr. Arafat has been co-patent author of multiple patent disclosures fi led for full patent applications. His broad exposure to technologies in product, systems and process design, among others has facilitated his leadership work on eVinci. Mr. Arafat has a B.S. in Chemical and Nuclear Engineering from the University of Pittsburgh and is pursuing a M.S. in Engineering Technology & Innovation Management at Carnegie Mellon University. Our Next Disruptive Technology “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” This statement, attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, one of the greatest minds in creative, practical inventions in human history, embodies the guiding principles of the Westinghouse eVinci™ micro reactor design. The eVinci design is based on demonstrated technology that can revolutionize how remote locations access clean, reliable energy. In co-development arrangements with national laboratories, design partners and utilities, Westinghouse is developing the eVinci micro reactor to serve remote residential, industrial and military energy consumers who are not connected to a national grid. The eVinci micro reactor employs a nuclear battery concept as the energy generator. It is being designed to deliver combined heat and power from 200 kWe to 5 MWe from a compact solid monolithic core that is surrounded by additional fi ssion product barriers and fully enclosed in a protective canister that can be transported by road, rail and sea. Westinghouse and the associated team are aiming to complete the design, testing, analysis and licensing to build a demonstration unit by 2022, test by 2023, and have the eVinci ready for commercial deployment by 2025. Although aggressive, Westinghouse believes it has the right strategy, skillset and lessons learned from previous experience in deploying fi rst-of-a-kind nuclear technology to meet this target. In addition, the company is working closely with Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) to expand on LANL’s successful development of heat pipe reactor technology. LANL has successfully implemented this technology for space applications, such as Kilopower, which was later re-conceptualized for a terrestrial application, called Megapower. The eVinci Micro Reactor design leverages the combined forces of LANL’s heat pipe technology and Westinghouse’s expertise in commercial reactor design, licensing and manufacturing. The resultant product will address some of today’s most challenging nuclear safety considerations, such as primary coolant loss, positive reactivity injection due to water entering the core, high-pressure eruptions and ejections, positive reactivity injection due to control rod ejection, and station blackout. It is an inherently safe reactor design that does not rely on a safety-related instrumentation and control system, AC power or operator actions to achieve safe shutdown, which will be a step-change in nuclear innovation. The eVinci micro reactor’s inherent safety is due to the design’s foundation of physics; it does not require computer signals or mechanical actuations to operate or shut down. Why eVinci and Why Now? According to Navigant Research, new distributed generation power capacity is overtaking new centralized generation capacity at a growing rate and may displace approximately 300 GW of new large-scale generation by 2026. Wanting to develop the next generation technology to address this global market trend, Westinghouse chose the alkali metal heat pipe technology at the heart of the eVinci micro reactor. Heat pipes enable a simple plant, eliminating the need for a reactor coolant pump, bulk coolant and associated equipment. Unlike a high-temperature gas reactor, a heat pipe reactor is not pressurized but can operate at temperatures greater than 650OC. Although heat pipes are passive (naturally driven), they can self-adjust the amount of heat transferred. The self- regulating behavior of the heat pipes and the solid core enables inherent load following. The resultant product can deliver reliable, affordable, fl exible and clean energy, with a new level of safety and operability. With the notion of creating a nuclear battery, the eVinci micro reactor is envisioned to be built and fueled within a factory and transported fully assembled