Peach Bottom HTGR

The core of the Peach Bottom HTGR contains 804 fuel elements (57), having an active fuel region about 7.5 ft (230 cm) in length with 24-in. 

The HTGR designed by the General Atomic Company and constructed at Peach Bottom, Pennsylvania, U.S.A., was a 40 MW(e) experimental power plant which was similar in many respects to the Dragon reactor. Peach Bottom started commercial operation on June 1, 1967, and ceased operation on October 31, 1974 [36]. The major performance parameters of the Peach Bottom Reactor are shown in Table 8. 

Helium at exit temperatures between 700 and 8(X)°C is used in the HTGR, and, of course, no reaction occurs between pure helium and the graphite even at high temperatures. However, small amounts of moisture or impurities could result in some mass transport so that it is necessary to purify the helium continuously. Good experience has been reported both from the Dragon project and from the Peach Bottom project in being able to maintain the impurity levels in the helium coolant gas at very low concentrations. 

Experience of the Th -U cycle was first obtained in the Indian Point boiling water reactor, where the first core, loaded in 1962, contained pellets of urania-thoria mixture. The main interest, however, has centered on its use in the high-temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTGR), and thorium has been employed as fertile material both in the prismatic fuel elements of the Dragon reactor in the United Kingdom and the Peach Bottom reactor in the United States, and in the spherical elements of the pebble-bed AVR in West Germany. There is also a possibility of adopting the thorium cycle in the... 

---