This repair job is truly a multidisciplinary work! People form mechanical engineering, nuclear, chemical and material science disciplines work together and fix the reactor.
That's the promise and the problem of nuclear reactors. With proper training and procedure they are pretty safe. Even with the accidents that have occurred, compared to the number in service and the time in service, it's incredibly safe. But at the same time it's not just something anyone can run. I think a coal plant could probably be figured out fairly easily, but with a nuclear reactor if anything is off it's a major and expensive repair job. I'm still pro nuclear by a long shot though
The idea there was no budget would have caused strained laughter among the people who actually worked on such projects. You literally have no idea what you are talking about. You literally should read a literal book, because I'm literally not sure how literate you are.
I am simply amazed by the ingenuity and engineering prowess of the workers who repaired the HRE-2 core vessel. The conditions they were working in were incredibly hazardous, with radiation levels that were off the charts. Yet they were able to develop and use specialized tools and equipment to diagnose and repair the holes in the vessel remotely. This video is a testament to the incredible skills and dedication of these workers. It is also a reminder of the important role that nuclear technology can play in our society.
My dad installed the trigga reactor on the Univ of Texas campus back in the '60s. I remember swimming in what would become the containment vessal....water was cold...lol
There are still aqueous homogeneous reactors in operation. One of the most prominent of these in current use is the ARGUS reactor at the Kurchatov Institute in Moscow which is currently used to produce medical radioisotopes. The isotopes themselves are extracted chemically from the fuel solution and have been found by Belgian scientists to be of extremely high radiochemical purity, exceeding established radiopharmaceutical standards by 2-4 orders of magnitude. Currently operating reactors of this design often employ nitrate based fuel rather than sulfates due to the lower risk of corrosion.
"Thus, the practicality of extremely difficult and totally unanticipated maintenance of circulating fuel reactors was demonstrated" Now that is how you finish a report asking for more funding for a project that has been a total catastrophe!
Meanwhile, GE, Westinghouse, Combustion Engineering, and Bacock and Wilcox were filling their order books with light water plants. This turd went nowhere, but sucked up research dollars for....something. The Westinghouse 4 loop reactor went on the be the gold standard in the industry, while this thing went on to be a footnote in history.
Sure the patience but also ignoring it (or at least letting it happen with foreknowledge) for two years! I guess they had their reasons, but a containment failure is a big problem engineering as it brings into question the stability of the entire vessel.
Talk about Bleeding edge technology! I had no idea that ultrasound transducers existed back in the 1950s, that must have been brand new technology back then and the cost of such tech would have been prohibitive for all but the nuclear power industry, or such as it was back then. This set up must have been used in the development of weapons grade plutonium or at least an integral part of it. I wonder how ling this reactor remained operational after its repair? I doubt that it would have lasted very much longer and would have been shut down and buried , since taking it out would have been a bad thing. This is why these experimental reactors were located next to hell's breakfast out in the middle of nowhere. Several of those experimental reactors suffered accidents that made them useless and were shut down, and the radioactive material from the reactor meltdown was buried out behind the building and then sectioned off to prevent people from ever accessing the land ever again.
Yeah, I was rather surprised at that. Overall nuclear is pretty safe as long as you handle the waste correctly and it doesn't go critical out of control. Still, a compromised vessel to an engineer is a huge red flag and I'd think they'd stop using it.
very ingenious instruments invented for inspection and repair. Although one must wonder why they were so happy go lucky in their approach to the whole project,, planning for worst case contingencies are a must these days.
Absolutely fascinating....the madness I fear while they're building this stuff and I say to myself: "That's going to get extremely radioactive. How are you going to fix that pump if it fails?" Then I watch this and they have to patch holes in the core vessel itself....truly an amazing time, even though it all seems desperately futile right now. Maybe it's almost time for a second nuclear renaissance...?
I know right. If that's how much radiation was in there after being shut down for a few days i can only imagine the radiation level when it was running.
I love well designed single use highly specific equipment and instrumentation. I wonder where the periscope and light system is today? Maybe in some ware house? Melted down? And some of that analog lab equipment looks entirely custom, I couldn't identify them. The one used for determining the thickness of the vessel wall looked particularly interesting.
@@whatisnuclear you're right - I finished watching the video after my comment and they said that all the tools were radioactive and had to be destroyed/disposed of accordingly. Such a shame, but understandable, I would have loved to take a look at them if it were possible.
A technical overview engineering video about a nuclear test reactor, with music from Tom & Jerry! So YT professional engineering videos nowadays with ridiculous background music, is not something new?
1:40 - A heavy water solution of uranyl sulfate, copper sulfate, and sulfuric acid on the low pressure side. I bet you that solution is completely non-corrosive. I wonder how it would be possible to eat through metal?
I wouldn't say that, there's always a few.. Nowadays good luck finding one who would want to work even if paid well .. or anyone willing to even pay a fair wage. Went from a $20 a week mortgage on a $5000 house, same house today almost $1000 a week on a $500000 house , but wages only went from $50 to $400 Cost of rent went from like 30% of salary to 130% how is anyone supposed to do anything?
