KLT-40 is a family of marine water-water (pressurized water) nuclear reactor plants developed at the Nizhny Novgorod Afrikantov OKBM (Experimental Design Bureau of Machine Building) on the basis of the OK-900 reactor plant used on Soviet nuclear icebreakers. The plants are intended for use on merchant and auxiliary vessels, as well as on floating nuclear power plants.[3]
Development history
Work on the KLT-40 began at OKBM in the mid-1970s under a special USSR government assignment. The occasion was a project for an icebreaker-transport vessel (Project 10081) that was to carry lighters (up to 74 units of 300 tons each) or ISO-standard containers (up to 1,328 twenty-foot units), break through ice a meter thick on its own, and make at least 20 knots at a draft of ten meters. The hull design was handled by the Leningrad Baltsudproekt Central Design Bureau.[3]
In 1988, the nuclear-powered lighter-container carrier Sevmorput, with a displacement of 61,000 tons — one of the largest non-military merchant ships with a nuclear power plant — entered service. The ship was equipped with a KLT-40 reactor, largely standardized with the OK-900 and OK-900A plants, which simplified manufacturing, installation, and operation. At the same time, the KLT-40 became the first in Soviet and Russian practice to receive a containment shell meeting all applicable safety requirements, including the international Code of Safety for Nuclear Merchant Ships developed by the IMO (International Maritime Organization); foreign inspectors verified the reactor's compliance with these codes.[3]
Design
The primary circuit of the KLT-40 consists of the reactor, four steam generators, and four two-speed primary-circuit circulation pumps, combined into a steam-generating unit by means of power nozzles. The steam-generating unit is housed in the caissons of the metal-water shielding tank. Coolant circulation is possible in three ways: with the pumps running at high and low speeds, with the cooldown pump running, and by natural convection during reactor cooldown. The core is assembled from a set of fuel assemblies with rod-type fuel elements, which makes refueling easier.[3]
The containment shell is designed for the internal pressure that would arise in the maximum design-basis accident — a full-section rupture of a primary-circuit pipeline. The accident pressure reduction system includes a bubbler tank with fresh water and safety plugs.[3]
The KLT-40S modification and the floating nuclear power plant Akademik Lomonosov
A modified version, the KLT-40S, was developed at Afrikantov OKBM for floating nuclear power plants, work on which had been under way since the 1970s. Russia's only floating nuclear power plant, Akademik Lomonosov, is equipped with two KLT-40S reactor plants with a combined thermal output of 150 MW and a net electrical output of 32 MW. Construction of the floating plant began in 2007 — first at the Sevmash shipyard in Severodvinsk, then at the Baltic Shipyard in Saint Petersburg; in 2019 Akademik Lomonosov arrived at its destination, the port of Pevek in Chukotka Autonomous Okrug, where it operates to this day.[1]
The plant replaces local nuclear and combined heat-and-power plants that have outlived their service life and supplies electricity to mining companies in western Chukotka. According to Alexander Uvarov, editor-in-chief of the industry portal Atominfo, Akademik Lomonosov is the world's second floating nuclear power plant for civilian use — the first was built by the United States for the needs of the Panama Canal Zone during the Vietnam War.[1]
The Nizhny Novgorod contribution
Development of the entire KLT-40 family is carried out at Afrikantov OKBM (Nizhny Novgorod), the key enterprise of the machine-building division (Atomenergomash) of the Rosatom state corporation.[1] The Nizhny Novgorod enterprise Sedakov Research Institute of Measuring Systems (a Federal State Unitary Enterprise, part of a Federal Research and Production Center) developed and manufactured the refueling complex control system (SU KP) for the KLT-40S reactor plant — a multifunctional, multi-level system with a hierarchical architecture that provides measurement of physical parameters, control of actuating mechanisms, and recording of technological processes during reactor core refueling. The system is entered in the State Register of Measuring Instruments of Russia (reg. no. 57868-14, registered in 2014).[2][4]
Sources
- Kommersant (Volga Region) — It Won't Seem Small — Kommersant Nizhny Novgorod
- grmetr.ru — 57868-14: Control System for the Refueling Complex for the KLT-40S Reactor Plant. Manufacture, Verification, Supply
- biblioatom.ru — KLT-40 / History of Reactors / History of the Main Systems // Evolution of the Industry /// History of Rosatom
- all-pribors.ru — 57868-14: KLT-40S Control System for the Refueling Complex for the Reactor Plant — Manufacturers, Suppliers, and Verifiers