Outlook for gas turbine plant utilization in htgr power facilities

The nuclear reactor power plants that have found greatest favor in the nuclear power industry worldwide are pressurized water reactors, boiling-water reactors, and uranium-graphite channel reactors with saturated-steam steam turbine units (PTU). The efficiency of power generating stations built around reactors such as these does not exceed 30 to 32%, and furthermore they are ''tied down'' to water reservoirs, with the entailed severe thermal effects on the environmental surroundings. The low efficiency range cited is evidence of inefficacious utilization of the nuclear fuel, reserves of which have their limits just as there are limits to available reserves of fossil fuels. Forecasts are being floated of a possible uranium crisis (profitable mining of uranium) in the mid-1990's, even with the expected development of breeder reactors to bridge the gap