Advanced gas cooled reactor, AGR

The large physical size of the later Magnox stations, such as Wylfa, led to the development of the more compact advanced gas-cooled reactor (AGR) design [31] that could utilize the standard turbine generator units available in the UK, Stainless-steel clad, enriched uranium oxide fuel can tolerate higher temperatures... 

Other newer designs include the advanced, gas-cooled reactor (AGR), Canadian deuterium reactor (CANDUR), sodium-cooled reactor (SCR), sodium-heated reactor (SHR), and fast breeder reactor (FBR). These reactors employ either natural or enriched uranium fuels that may be modified in some way (e.g., graphite-moderated fuels). 

Hood, E.M. Clough, P.N. (1984) The behaviour of iodine in Advanced Gas-cooled Reactor (AGR) circuits. In Fifth International Meeting on Thermal Nuclear Reactor Safety, compiled G. Book H. Rininsland. vol. 3, pp. 1432-41. Karlsruhe Nuclear Research Center. 

The advanced gas-cooled reactors (AGR) are a further development of the Magnox-reactors. They were only built in Great Britain. They utilize lightly-enriched uranium in oxide form. The gas exit temperatures are significantly... 

After an initial failed attempt to privatize nuclear power with the rest of the British electricity industry in 1990, the government put the nuclear stations into two state-owned companies. Nuclear Electric for the English and Welsh stations, and Scottish Nuclear for the Scottish stations. In 1995 the more modern advanced gas cooled reactor (AGR) stations plus the new pressurized water reactor (PWR) at Sizewell were privatized in the form of a new company, British Energy pic. The older Magnox reactors were retained in a company called Magnox Electric. 

Two reprocessing plants are in operation at Sellafield. The Magnox reprocessing plant, which commenced operation in 1964, processes irradiated uranium (U) metal fuel from UK and overseas Magnox reactors. The THORP (Thermal Oxide Reprocessing Plant), which commenced operation in 1994, reprocesses enriched uranium oxide fuel principally from Light Water Reactors (LWR) in Europe and Japan and Advanced Gas Cooled Reactors (AGR) in the UK. 

The Advanced Gas-cooled Reactors (AGR) are built into PCPV with internal boilers and gas circulators. The uranium-enriched oxide fuel is clad in stainless steel so that the risk of a charmel fire or fuel meltdown under fault conditions inherent in the Magnox design has been greatly reduced. 

The purpose of this section is to compare the features of the RBMK reactor operated at Chernobyl with reactor types pertinent to the UK. It will be recollected that the RBMK covers a large number of reactors and the comparisons made are indeed with Chernobyl No. 4. The UK reactors covered are in three classes the commercial reactors now built and operated or in commission (Magnox and Advanced Gas-cooled Reactor (AGR)) the prototype Steam Generating Heavy Water Reactor (SGHWR) and Prototype Fast Reactor (PFR) that have comparable performance to commercial reactors and the proposed Pressurised Water Reactor (PWR) or Sizewell B design which, it... 

The main responsibility of the Remote Inspection Project is the design, developaent and procurement of the remote visual Inspection equipment provided by the Generation Development and Construction Division of the CEGB for use on the Advanced Gas-Cooled Reactors (AGR). Papers presented to previous BNES symposia (Refs.l, 2) describe the equipment being developed by the group for carrying out routine remote visual Inspection on all the AGR s with the exception of Heysham 2 and Torness and also the evolution of techniques used for specialist non-routine inspections using TV cameras and fibrescopes. 

The Advanced Gas-Cooled Reactor (AGR) was previously discussed in some detail. The AGR is reported to have a development potential beyond the Dungeness B design. If the unclad fuel element development for the reactor is successful, the conversion ratio of the AGR may be improved significantly with some probable decrease in fuel cycle cost. 

The vast majority (80%) of the reactors mentioned are light-water-moderated reactors (LWR). The LWR subdivide in 60% PWR and 20% BWR. The remaining 20% of the reactors are divided among CANadian Deuterium Uranium reactor (CANDU), Reaktor Bolshoi Moshchnosti Kanalny (RBMK), large power channel reactor, gas-cooled reactor (GCR), advanced gas-cooled reactor (AGR), and fast breeder reactor (FBR). 

A variety of fuel elanents are used for different types of reactors, but there are some common features. In most conunercial nnclear power plants (BWR [boiling water reactors] and PWR [pressurized water reactors] that are called in Russian VVER), the pellets are inserted into rods or tubes (usually zirconium alloys) that provide a barrier to prevent escape of fission products, the tubes or rods are arranged in bundles that are loaded into the reactor core. Usually a number of short rods are inserted into the sealed tube and held in place by a spring as described earlier. In some cases, like advanced gas cooled reactors (AGR), peUets are inserted into short narrow steel pins. Magnox reactors use magnesium alloys (usually with aluminum) rather the zirconium alloys. The fuel in some advanced reactors (TRISO) is in the form of microfuel particles with a UO2 (or UC (uranium carbide)) core surrounded by layers of pyrolytic carbon and... 

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