High temperature thorium fueled reactor THTR

A second type of GCR used the pebble bed concept with helium as a coolant. The uranium and thorium fuel was imbedded in graphite spheres and cooled with helium. The high temperature thorium fueled reactor (THTR) operated between 1985 and 1989 in Germany. It produced 760 MWt and 307 MWe. The thorium in the fuel pellets was used to breed Two GCR power plants have been operated in the United States. The first was Peach Bottom Unit 1, which provided 40 MWe. The second was the Fort St. Vrain reactor, which provided 330 MWe. 

The LS-VHTR uses the same type of coated-particle graphite-matrix fuel that has been successfully used in high-temperature gas-cooled reactors such as the Peach Bottom Reactor, the Fort St. Viain Reactor (FSVR), the Arbeitsgemeinshaft Versuchsreaktor (AVR), and the Thorium High-Temperature Reactor (THTR). At this time, graphite-based fuels have been demonstrated to be compatible with only two coolants helium and fluoride salts. 

The Arbeitsgemeinschaft Versuchsreaktor (AVR) and Thorium High-Temperature Reactor (THTR-300) were both helium-cooled reactors of the pebble-bed design [29,42,43]. The major design parameters of the AVR and THTR are shown in Table 10. Construction started on the AVR in 1961 and full power operation at 15MW(e) commenced in May 1967. The core of the AVR consisted of approximately 100,000 spherical pebble type fuel elements (see Section 5). The pebble bed was surrounded by a cylindrical graphite reflector and structural carbon... 

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