The document discusses nuclear power plants and fissile and fertile materials. It provides information on: 1) The key components of a nuclear power plant, including the nuclear reactor, steam generators, pressurizer, and reactor coolant pumps. 2) How nuclear power plants produce electricity through using heat from nuclear fission to create steam that drives turbines. 3) The differences between fissile materials, which can sustain nuclear fission, and fertile materials, which can be converted to fissile materials through neutron absorption.

1. Career Point University
Submitted To:-
Mr. Kamal Arora
DEAN
Career Point University,Kota
Nuclear Power Plant
Fissile and Fertile Materials
Submitted By:-
Mukul Sharma (K11553)
B.Tech , 5th sem , EE

2. Contents
 Nuclear Power Plant
Components of a nuclear power plant
Nuclear Power plant Electricity Production
Advantages of Nuclear Power
Disadvantages of Nuclear Power
 Fertile material
Fissile materials from fertile materials
 Fissile Material
List of fissile materials
 Application of Fertile and Fissile material
 Difference between Fissile and Fertile

3. Nuclear Power Plant
 A nuclear power plant (nuclear power station) looks like a standard thermal power
station with one exception. The heat source in the nuclear power plant is a nuclear
reactor. As is typical in all conventional thermal power stations the heat is used to
generate steam which drives a steam turbine connected to a generator which produces
electricity.
 Steam turbine is a common feature of all thermal power plants. Steam Turbine was
invented in 1884 by Sir Charles . Exceptional feature of the nuclear power plant is the
nuclear reactor and its safety and auxiliary systems.
 The nuclear power plant consist of two main buildings:
Containment building (houses Nuclear Reactor)
Turbine building (houses Turbo Generator)

5. Components of a nuclear power plant
 Nuclear Reactor. A nuclear reactor is a key device of nuclear power plants. Main purpose of the
nuclear reactor is to initiate and control a sustained nuclear chain reaction.
 Steam Generators. Steam generators are heat exchangers used to convert feedwater into steam from
heat produced in a nuclear reactor core. They are used in pressurized water reactors (PWR) between
the primary and secondary coolant loops.
 Pressurizer. Pressure in the primary circuit is maintained by a pressurizer, a separate vessel that is
connected to the primary circuit (hot leg) and partially filled with water which is heated to the
saturation temperature (boiling point) for the desired pressure by submerged electrical heaters.
Temperature in the pressurizer can be maintained at 345 °C (653 °F).
 Reactor Coolant Pumps. Reactor coolant pumps are used to pump primary coolant around the
primary circuit. These pumps are powerful, they can consume up to 6 MW each and they can be used
for heating the primary coolant before a reactor start-up.

6. Nuclear Power plant Electricity Production
 The heat is produced by fission in a nuclear reactor and passes into the
primary cooling water. This heat, deposited in the cooling water, is conducted
to the steam generators situated in the containment building. Steam generators
produce high pressurized steam. The pressurized steam is then usually fed to a
multi-stage steam turbine. Steam turbines in western nuclear power plants are
among the largest steam turbines ever

7. Advantages of Nuclear Power
 Nuclear electricity is reliable and relatively cheap (with an average
generating cost of 2.9 cents per kW/h) once the reactor is in place and
operating.
 Large reserves of Uranium in United States - Fuel for nuclear power plants
will not run out for tens of thousands of years
 Nuclear power plants contribute no greenhouse gasses and few atmospheric
pollutants

8. Disadvantages of Nuclear Power
 Uranium is ultimately a nonrenewable resource.
 Nuclear power plants are extremely costly to build.
 The slight possibility that nuclear power plants can have
catastrophic failures.
 Large environmental impact during the mining and processing
stages of uranium are numerous.
 Nuclear waste (Spent nuclear fuel) is extremely hazardous and must
be stored safely for thousands of years.

9. Fertile material
Fertile material is a material that, although not itself fissionable by thermal
neutrons, can be converted into a fissile material by neutron absorption and
subsequent nuclei conversions
In nuclear engineering, fertile material (nuclide) is material that can be
converted to fissile material by neutron transmutation and subsequent nuclear
decay. The process of the transmutation of fertile materials to fissile materials is
referred to as fuel breeding. There are two basic fertile materials: 238U and 232Th.

10. Fissile materials from Fertile materials
A fast-neutron reactor , meaning one with little or
no neutron moderator and hence utilizing fast neutrons,
can be configured as a breeder reactor, producing more
fissile material than it consumes, using fertile material in
a blanket around the core, or contained in special fuel
rods.
Since plutonium-238, plutonium 240 and plutonium-
242 are fertile, accumulation of these and other non
fissile isotopes is less of a problem than in thermal
reactors, which cannot burn them efficiently. Breeder
reactors using thermal-spectrum neutrons are only
practical if the thorium fuel cycle is used, as uranium-
233 fissions far more reliably with thermal neutrons than
plutonium-239.

11. Fissile Material
 In nuclear engineering, fissile material (nuclide) is material that is
capable of undergoing fission reaction after absorbing thermal (slow
or low energy) neutron. These materials are used to fuel
thermal nuclear reactors, because they are capable of sustaining
a nuclear fission chain reaction.
 For heavy nuclides with atomic number of higher than 90, most of
fissile isotopes meet the fissile rule

12. List of fissile materials
 Fissile nuclides in nuclear fuels include:
Uranium-235 which occurs in natural uranium and enriched uranium.
Plutonium-239 bred from uranium-238 by neutron capture.
Plutonium-241 bred from plutonium-240 by neutron capture. The 240Pu comes from 239Pu by the
same process.
Uranium-233 bred from thorium-232 by neutron capture.
 P
 Plutonium-239
Plutonium-241
 U
Uranium-233
Uranium-235

13. Application of Fertile and fissile Materials
Fissile Material
In nuclear engineering, fissile
material is material capable of
sustaining a nuclear fission chain
reaction. By definition, fissile
material can sustain a chain reaction
with neutrons of any energy. The
predominant neutron energy may be
typified by either slow neutrons (i.e.,
a thermal system) or fast neutrons.
Fertile Material
Proposed applications for fertile material
includes a space-based facility for the
manufacture of fissile material for
spacecraft nuclear propulsion.
The facility would notionally transport
fertile materials from Earth, safely
through the atmosphere, and locate them at
a space facility at the Earth–Moon L1
Lagrangian point where man-1

14. Difference between Fissile and Fertile
 Fissile material consist of fissionable isotopes that are capable of
undergoing nuclear fission only after capturing a thermal
neutron. 238U is not fissile isotope, because 238U cannot be fission by
thermal neutron. 238U does not meet also alternative requirement to
fissile materials. 238U is not capable of sustaining a nuclear fission
chain reaction, because neutrons produced by fission of 238U have
lower energies than original neutron (usually below the threshold
energy of 1 MeV). Typical fissile materials: 235U, 233U, 239Pu, 241Pu.
 Fertile material consist of isotopes that are not fissionable by
thermal neutrons, but can be converted into fissile isotopes (after
neutron absorption and subsequent nuclear decay). Typical fertile
materials: 238U, 232Th.