"Better Water Reactors"

This week, we talk Boiling Water Reactors (BWRs) with James Krellenstein, the CEO of Alva Energy. We dive into the engineering, history, and physics of these reactors, how they differ from other designs, and why the United States may have erred in not choosing the Advanced Boiling Water Reactor (ABWR) instead of the Westinghouse AP-1000 for the Vogtle nuclear power plant.For this episode, we’ve included a glossary below to help with unfamiliar terms: ABWR: Advanced Boiling Water Reactor ATWS: Anticipated Transient Without Scram BORAX experiments: Historical experiments testing reactor limits through deliberate failures BWR: Boiling Water Reactor COPS: Containment Overpressure Protection System CRDM: Control Rod Drive Mechanism ESBWR: Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactor FLEX: Diverse and Flexible Coping Strategies (post-Fukushima enhancements) FOAK: First of a kind IGSCC: Intergranular Stress Corrosion Cracking NOAK: N-nth of a kind NRC: Nuclear Regulatory Commission NSSS: Nuclear Steam Supply System (N Triple-S) PRA: Probabilistic Risk Assessment PWR: Pressurized Water Reactor RCIC: Reactor Core Isolation Cooling System RPV: Reactor Pressure Vessel SLC: Standby Liquid Control System Read more on Substack!