3 ms·
Not a nuke guy -- if you slow/stop the reaction, and the salt solidifies in all the piping, how do you get it started again? Sure, the salt near the reactor be
by chiph 10y ago
Not a nuke guy -- if you slow/stop the reaction, and the salt solidifies in all the piping, how do you get it started again? Sure, the salt near the reactor becomes liquid again, but there's no flow through the pipes to the pumps & heat exchanger and all you have is convection flow in/near the vessel itself, and maybe the heat eventually works its way through the plumbing.
Do you wrap all the pipes & pumps in heat tape?
- ars 10y agoThey use salts that melt at low temperature, and don't boil easily. So they are unlikely to ever get cold enough to solidify, and if they do, can be melted with external energy. And yes, they do insulate the pipes. So heat from the reactor would eventually flow and melt all the salt.
- acidburnNSA 10y agoThey also do run heater wires along the pipes. Same with liquid metal cooled reactors.