In our last Sustainability class, we took a trip to the nuclear fission reactor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Upon arriving we were show into classroom and given a lecture about nuclear energy and nuclear power plants.
We were taught that this MIT reactor has been running since 1958 and was upgraded in 1975 to have the capacity that it has today. It produces five MW of thermal power twenty-four seven using nuclear fission technology. No greenhouse gases are produced and water is used as a coolant to keep this reactor dedicated for peaceful applications.
A nuclear reactor works by shooting neutrons into atoms to cause splitting. Uranium 235 is used for fission because it absorbs neutrons and therefore becomes uranium 236. By shooting neutrons through the atoms it destroys the strong nuclear force, which holds nucleons together. When the force “lets go” of itself, it comes out as energy. The mass before fission is less than the mass after, which is called mass defect. This multiplied by the square of the speed of light is the amount of energy released for every split.
Energy is lost in transforming from one energy to another. For example, thermal energy transformed to electric. For this, water is used as a medium but the best transformation efficiency with this is only about 30% using steam. This is because steam pressure is increased and energy is used to do this.
The MIT fission reactor consists of four tanks surrounded by five foot thick heavy concrete to stop radiation.
You mean “the square of the speed of light”
yes, I do