High Temperature Gas-Cooled Reactor Coupled with High Temperature Steam Electrolysis

The US Department of Energy is investigating the use of high-temperature gas-cooled reactors (HTGR) to produce electricity and hydrogen. Although the hydrogen production processes using the nuclear energy are in an early stage of development, coupling hydrogen plant to HTGR requires both efficient heat transfer and adequate separation of the facilities to assure that off-normal events in the production facility do not impact the nuclear plant. In anticipation of the design, development and procurement of an advanced power conversion system for HTGR, this study was initiated to identify the major design and technology options and their tradeoffs in the evaluation of power conversion unit (PCU) coupled to the hydrogen plant. In this study, we investigated a number of design configurations and performed thermal hydraulic analyses using various working fluids and various conditions. Also using the high temperature steam electrolysis process (HTSE), we calculated the energy requirement for the operation of the HTSE. The balance of the plant of the HTSE was developed and the HTGR was modeled to be coupled with the HTSE. This paper presents a portion of results obtained from this study. (authors)