Se ti interessa guardare il nostro video in lingua italiana clicca questo link:
• Come funziona una cent...
• Find out more about our project:
www.jaescompan...
• Here are some products installed by our technicians:
www.jaescompan...
JAES is a company specialized in the maintenance of industrial plants with a customer support at 360 degrees, from the technical advice to maintenance, until final delivery of the industrial spare parts.
Linkedin: / jaes-srl
Facebook: / jaescompany
Technological development over the years
allowed to acquire knowledge of extraordinary
physical principles such as: x-ray discovery
which revolutionised medicine, Newton’s work
which allowed Einstein to work on the theory of
relativity or the atom discovery which led to
nuclear fission.
All these accomplishments have always divided
the opinion of the scientific community, who
considered these discoveries magnificent but at
the same time dangerous in certain ways.
For many years now, the society of the 21 st
century have been questioning a discovery that
revolutionised the world: we’re talking about the
nuclear power!
Nuclear, or atomic, energy is the energy
obtained from nuclear reactions and radioactive
decay in the form of kinetic energy and is used
by numerous technologies, such as nuclear
power plants to obtain electricity. In 2020,
nuclear power produced only 10% of global
electricity, even though it is one of the safest
sources in terms of deaths per unit of energy
produced. So, why does the public have
reservations about using this technology?
Let’s find out together how does a nuclear
power plant works and let's see each step in
detail.
Nuclear power plants are huge and very
complex buildings which are used as power
plants and produce energy through nuclear
fission.
Nuclear fission is a reaction in which the
nucleus of a heavy element decays by emitting
a large amount of energy; the reaction occurs
when a heavy metal nucleus, such as uranium-
235, is bombarded, i.e. hit, by a neutron that
breaks up the nucleus, releasing three new
neutrons and energy.
One of these neutrons is absorbed by another
uranium-238 nucleus and is lost in the balance,
a second neutron can escape from the system,
and the third neutron hits another uranium-235
nucleus, which breaks up, releasing more
neutrons, which in turn will hit other uranium-
235 nuclei, thus creating a chain reaction.
This reaction is the core of the nuclear reactor,
which handles the decay of heavy material in a
controlled manner. Now let's see what a nuclear power plant looks
like and how it works!
The facility is divided into two islands: the first
one corresponds to the building that contains
the reactor and is called nuclear island, while
the second one is called conventional island
where the nuclear power obtained is handled
and transformed into electricity.
Externally, the nuclear island presents itself as
a huge block of concrete to isolate the reactor
placed at the centre of the facility. In the reactor
we find the core or nucleus composed of fissile
material, usually a mixture of uranium-238 and
uranium-235. A moderator, usually heavy
water or graphite, is used to slow down the
generated neutrons, increasing the probability
of fission.
There are also metal control rods in the reactor
that are used to capture excess neutrons, and
are inserted into the core to moderate the
power of the reaction, and if necessary to stop
the process in case of criticality. Should the
reaction reach the critical level, it would release
an enormous amount of energy that would
cause the core to melt, destroying the
containing walls and dispersing radioactive
material into the environment. The fragments of
the reaction slowing down produce heat that is
captured by a heat-transfer liquid surrounding
the uranium core. To put it simply, the heat-
transfer liquid acts in the same way as hot
water in a heating system with radiators, in
which the water carries the heat generated by
the boiler to various points in the room. The
compressed heat-transfer liquid reaching the
core has a temperature of 290 °C, and
increases to 320 °C at a pressure of 15 MPa so
that it does not boil.
The heated liquid passes through a steam
generator, in which a saturated wet vapour is
produced, at this point it passes through a
moisture separator that transforms it into a
saturated dry vapour, and with a conductor
system it is transported to a steam turbine
located in the conventional island at a final
temperature of 290 °C at a pressure of 5 MPa.
A pressuriser is used to keep the pressure
stable. The turbine is a driving machine that
uses the thermal energy of steam, converting it
into mechanical work. Using the converted
energy, the turbine moves an alternator, which
is used to produce electricity; the same
principle is used in the most common fuel-fired
power...
5 сен 2024
