10,000th cycle of the Annular Core Research Reactor

With a muffled "pop," a flash of blue light and a few ripples through 14,000 gallons of deionized water, Sandia National Laboratories' Annular Core Research Reactor (ACRR) recently conducted its 10,000th operation. During a maximum pulse, the ACRR generates a whopping 35,000 megawatts of power for seven milliseconds.

Read more at https://share.sandia.gov/news/resources/news_releases/acrr/

SAND 2011-7841P

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Sandia
• National
• Laboratories
• Annular
• Core
• Research
• Reactor
• megawatts
• nuclear
• science
• research
• experiment

[enthalpy]

@KyleGotSkill They brought the reactor from subcritical (offline) to supercritical.

This is the same mode that nuclear bombs operate in during the fraction of a second between releasing energy and exploding. Research reactors are designed to do the same thing w/out blowing up for test purposes.

[pancakguy]

@MOLRobocop @ MOLRobocop: Three of the regulating rods are ejected (not all of them) and held up with compressed gas. After a time delay a computer system drops the designated rods and scrams the reactor to ensure it remains shut down. Doppler broadening shuts the chain reaction down much faster than the "SCRAM" action of the rods and turns power as temperature rises in the fuel. The reactor power levels rise and fall in 7ms, much faster than a typical operator can hit a scram button.

[BeondaPale]

One question, what would happen if something went wrong?

[trustthewater]

I think that if I had been working there I would have had 9,999 minor heart attacks prior to this event. Amazing work, but with all the bogey-man hype around nuclear technology I would have wet my pants even if I knew it was constructed by some of the brightest minds in the world.

[MsShipbuilder]

I have a question. After the pulse of the reactor core rise the gas bubbles. What kind of gas? These are the products of radiolysis of water? Or is it just water vapor?

[MOLRobocop]

@pancakguy That is awesome and scary. Thank you for the explanation.

[Gameworms]

i have no idea whats going on even after reading the description

[KyleGotSkill]

@enthalpy thank you sir

[MOLRobocop]

@enthalpy So does this mean they removed all the control rods suddenly to suddenly start the reaction, and then put them back in when they hit a specific power-output or temperature? Hit the SCRAM button or something?