(182f) Technical Barriers and Opportunities in Nuclear Plant/Hydrogen Plant Connection Technologies

Nuclear powered hydrogen production can be performed today using liquid water electrolysis. Unfortunately, the cost of hydrogen produced from liquid water electrolysis is not yet economically competitive with hydrogen produced from fossil fuel sources for large-scale applications, and other methods are sought for producing hydrogen that take advantage of a nuclear power source (no greenhouse gas emissions, domestic fuel source, high power density) at lower cost.

Nearly all nuclear-powered hydrogen production processes currently under study ? the Sulfur-Iodine process, Calcium-Bromine process, and others ? require the use of thermal energy in addition to electricity for splitting water. This necessitates the development of a thermal transmission network to connect the nuclear plant with the hydrogen production plant.

While progress has been made on the development of individual enabling technologies, such as the identification of candidate high temperature materials and heat exchanger designs, and preliminary system modeling, much still remains to be solved in order to design and construct a thermal transmission interface capable of transmitting many megawatts of thermal power over long distances safely, efficiently, and that can operate for sustained periods of time at temperatures up to 1000 ºC.

Within the materials area, corrosion, creep, and the reliability of metal/ceramic bonding techniques remain significant problems. In component design, innovations are needed to develop efficient and economic high-temperature heat exchangers that can resist high mechanical and thermal stresses. In the area of safety, more work is needed to incorporate existing chemical plant operating experience into conceptual designs and on-going safety analyses in order to support future environmental and nuclear licensing documentation.

This presentation will focus on specific materials, component design, and safety issues related to the development of the nuclear plant/hydrogen plant thermal interface. Multiple solutions are possible, but solutions must be balanced with costs. Nuclear hydrogen production will not become a practical reality at an industrial scale if the cost of the hydrogen produced is excessive. The thermal interface must be functional without its cost becoming a deciding factor in the implementation of nuclear-powered hydrogen production technologies.