APR-1400
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The APR-1400 (for Advanced Power Reactor 1400  MW electricity) is an advanced pressurized water nuclear reactor designed by the
Korea Electric Power Corporation Korea Electric Power Corporation, better known as KEPCO (Hangul: 켑코) or Hanjeon (Hangul: 한전), is the largest electric utility in South Korea, responsible for the generation, transmission and distribution of electricity and the developme ...
(KEPCO). Originally known as the Korean Next Generation Reactor (KNGR), this
Generation III reactor Generation III reactors, or Gen III reactors, are a class of nuclear reactors designed to succeed Generation II reactors, incorporating evolutionary improvements in design. These include improved fuel technology, higher thermal efficiency, sign ...
was developed from the earlier
OPR-1000 __NOTOC__ The OPR-1000 is a South Korean designed two-loop 1000 MWe PWR Generation II nuclear reactor, developed by KHNP and KEPCO. The OPR-1000 was originally designated as the Korean Standard Nuclear Power Plant (KSNP), and was re-designated as ...
design and also incorporates features from the US
Combustion Engineering Combustion Engineering (C-E) was a multi-national American-based engineering firm that developed nuclear steam supply power systems in the United States. Originally headquartered in New York City, C-E moved its corporate offices to Stamford, Connec ...
(C-E) System 80+ design. Currently in
South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...
there are 3 units in operation ( Shin Kori unit 3 and 4, Shin Hanul unit 1), and 3 units in construction ( Shin Hanul unit 2, Shin Kori unit 5 and 6). Two units are completed and in commercial operation in the
United Arab Emirates The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia (The Middle East). It is located at th ...
at
Barakah In Islam, ''Barakah'' or ''Baraka'' ( ar, بركة "blessing") is a blessing power, a kind of continuity of spiritual presence and revelation that begins with God and flows through that and those closest to God. Baraka can be found within physi ...
, with two more under construction at the same plant.


History

APR-1400 design began in 1992 and was awarded certification by the Korean Institute of Nuclear Safety in May 2002. The design certification application was submitted to the US
Nuclear Regulatory Commission The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is an independent agency of the United States government tasked with protecting public health and safety related to nuclear energy. Established by the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974, the NRC began operat ...
(NRC) in December 2014 and in March 2015, it was accepted for technical review to determine if the reactor design meets basic US safety requirements. In October 2017, European Utility Requirements (EUR) organization approved changes to the APR-1400 design for emergency cooling, allowing the design to be built in countries outside Europe to EUR certification. As of September 2018, the NRC issued its final safety evaluation report and standard design approval finding the design technically acceptable and valid for 15 years. In April 2019 the NRC approved a rule to certify the APR-1400 standard design. In September 2018, the U.S.
Nuclear Regulatory Commission The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is an independent agency of the United States government tasked with protecting public health and safety related to nuclear energy. Established by the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974, the NRC began operat ...
gave the APR-1400 Standard Design Approval, and in September 2019 it received a design certificate valid for 15 years.


Locations


South Korea

The first commercial APR-1400 reactors at Shin Kori were approved in September 2007, with construction starting in October 2008 (Unit 3) and August 2009 (Unit 4). Shin Kori-3 was initially scheduled to commence operation by the end of 2013, but the schedules for both Units 3 & 4 were delayed by approximately one year to replace safety-related control cabling, which had failed some tests. Construction of two more APR-1400 units at Shin Kori, Korea (Units 5 and 6) had been expected to begin in 2014, but as of December 2016 plans had not been finalised. Construction of two new APR-1400s, Shin Hanul Units 1 & 2, began in May 2012 (Unit 1) and June 2013 (Unit 2), with Unit 1 expected to be completed in April 2017. Two more APR-1400s at Shin Hanul were approved in 2014, with construction to start in 2017. After the election of President
Moon Jae-in Moon Jae-in (; ; born 24 January 1953) is a South Korean former politician, civil servant and lawyer who served as the 12th president of South Korea between 2017 and 2022. Prior to his presidency, he served as Senior Secretary for Civil Affairs an ...
in May 2017, KHNP suspended design work on Shin Hanul-3 and -4, and construction work was suspended on Shin Kori-5 and -6 in July 2017 for a three-month period while a government-appointed committee met to discuss the country's future nuclear power policy. President Moon had signed an agreement in March 2017 calling for the phase-out of nuclear energy while campaigning for president. In October 2017, the committee recommended proceeding with the construction of Shin Kori-5 and -6. President Moon announced he supported the committee's decision, but added that no new construction would be allowed, throwing doubt on the fate of Shin Hanul-3 and -4. As of April 2020, Shin-Kori 1 and 2 and Shin-Hanul 1 are operational while Shin-Hanul 2 being loaded with fuel.


United Arab Emirates

In December 2009, a KEPCO-led consortium was awarded the contract to build four APR-1400 reactors at
Barakah In Islam, ''Barakah'' or ''Baraka'' ( ar, بركة "blessing") is a blessing power, a kind of continuity of spiritual presence and revelation that begins with God and flows through that and those closest to God. Baraka can be found within physi ...
, United Arab Emirates. Construction of Barakah Unit 1 started in July 2012, Unit 2 started construction in May 2013, Unit 3 started construction in September 2014 and Unit 4 started construction in September 2015. Block 1 started to produce energy on 1 August 2020 and went into commercial operation on 6 April 2021.


United Kingdom

NuGeneration NuGeneration (NuGen) was a company that planned to build a new nuclear power station nearby the Sellafield nuclear site in the United Kingdom. The proposed site was called '' Moorside'', and is to the north and west of Sellafield. On 8 November ...
(NuGen) was formed as the joint venture between
Engie Engie SA is a French multinational utility company, headquartered in La Défense, Courbevoie, which operates in the fields of energy transition, electricity generation and distribution, natural gas, nuclear, renewable energy and petroleum. ...
,
Iberdrola Iberdrola () is a Spanish multinational electric utility company based in Bilbao, Spain. Iberdrola has a workforce of around 34,000 employees serving around 31.67 million customers. Subsidiaries include Scottish Power (United Kingdom) ...
, and
Scottish and Southern Energy SSE plc (formerly Scottish and Southern Energy plc) is a multinational energy company headquartered in Perth, Scotland Perth (Scottish English, locally: ; gd, Peairt ) is a city in central Scotland, on the banks of the River Tay. It is th ...
(SSE) to develop the Moorside Nuclear Power Station in
Cumbria Cumbria ( ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in North West England, bordering Scotland. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local government, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. Cumb ...
; the initial plans called for three Westinghouse
AP1000 The AP1000 is a nuclear power plant designed and sold by Westinghouse Electric Company. The plant is a pressurized water reactor with improved use of passive nuclear safety and many design features intended to lower its capital cost and impr ...
units. SSE was bought out by Engie and Iberdrola in 2011, and Iberdrola's share, in turn, was purchased by
Toshiba , commonly known as Toshiba and stylized as TOSHIBA, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Its diversified products and services include power, industrial and social infrastructure system ...
in 2013. Following the bankruptcy of Toshiba's subsidiary
Westinghouse Electric Corporation The Westinghouse Electric Corporation was an American manufacturing company founded in 1886 by George Westinghouse. It was originally named "Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company" and was renamed "Westinghouse Electric Corporation" in ...
in March 2017, Engie pulled out of NuGen in July, leaving Toshiba as the sole owner of NuGen. In December 2017, NuGen announced that KEPCO was named the preferred bidder to acquire NuGen from Toshiba. In July 2018 Kepco’s preferred bidder status was terminated, in response to difficulties financing the development.


Poland

In October 2022, Polish utilities PGE and ZE PAK announced an agreement with KHNP to build a number of APR-1400 reactors near ZE PAK's coal-fired plant at Pątnów.


Summary

;Notes


Design

The APR-1400 is an evolutionary Advanced Light Water Reactor which is based on the previous
OPR-1000 __NOTOC__ The OPR-1000 is a South Korean designed two-loop 1000 MWe PWR Generation II nuclear reactor, developed by KHNP and KEPCO. The OPR-1000 was originally designated as the Korean Standard Nuclear Power Plant (KSNP), and was re-designated as ...
design. Under Korean conditions, the reactor produced 1455 MW gross electrical power with a thermal power capacity of 3983 MW (4000 MW nominal). The design was developed to meet 43 design requirements, with the main developments being evolution in capacity, increased lifetime and enhanced safety. The design improvements also focus on meeting economic objectives and licensing requirements. Compared to the OPR-1000, the key features are: * Net Electric power: 1400 MW (40% increase) * Design Life: 60 years (50% increase) * Seismic Design Basis: 0.3g (50% increase) * Core Damage Frequency: less than 10−5/yr (10x decrease) * Core fuel assemblies: 241 (36% increase) Several other changes were incorporated such as moving to complete digital I/C and implementation of new systems in the Safety Injection System (SIT).


Core

The reactor core of the APR-1400 consists of 241 fuel assemblies, 93 control element assemblies, and 61 in-core instrumentation assemblies. Each fuel assembly has 236 fuel rods in a 16 x 16 array (some space is taken up by guide tubes for control elements) containing
Uranium dioxide Uranium dioxide or uranium(IV) oxide (), also known as urania or uranous oxide, is an oxide of uranium, and is a black, radioactive, crystalline powder that naturally occurs in the mineral uraninite. It is used in nuclear fuel rods in nuclear rea ...
(average enrichment of 2.6 w/o), which is capable of producing an average volumetric power density of 100.9 W/cm^3. Up to 30% of the core can also be loaded with
Mixed Oxide In chemistry, a mixed oxide is a somewhat informal name for an oxide that contains cations of more than one chemical element or cations of a single element in several states of oxidation.Advanced Inorganic Chemistry, F. A. Cotton, G. Wilkinson ...
fuel with minor modifications. The core is designed for an 18-month operating cycle with a discharge
burnup In nuclear power technology, burnup (also known as fuel utilization) is a measure of how much energy is extracted from a primary nuclear fuel source. It is measured as the fraction of fuel atoms that underwent fission in %FIMA (fissions per ini ...
up to 60,000 MWD/MTU, with a thermal margin of 10%. For the control element assemblies, 76
Boron carbide Boron carbide (chemical formula approximately B4C) is an extremely hard boron–carbon ceramic, a covalent material used in tank armor, bulletproof vests, engine sabotage powders, as well as numerous industrial applications. With a Vickers hard ...
pellets rods are used in the full strength control rods, while 17
Inconel Inconel is a registered trademark of Special Metals Corporation for a family of austenitic nickel-chromium-based superalloys. Inconel alloys are oxidation-corrosion-resistant materials well suited for service in extreme environments subjected t ...
-625 is used in the part strength control rods.


Primary

Like the OPR-1000 and preceding C-E designs, the APR-1400 has two reactor coolant loops. In each loop, heated primary coolant leaves the reactor pressure vessel (RPV) through one hot leg, passing through one
steam generator A Steam generator is a device used to boil water to create steam. More specifically, it may refer to: *Boiler (steam generator), a closed vessel in which water is heated under pressure *Monotube steam generator *Supercritical steam generator or Ben ...
(SG), returning to the reactor vessel through two cold legs, each equipped with a reactor coolant pump (RCP). In loop 2, there is one pressurizer (PZR) on the hot leg, where a steam bubble is maintained during operation. The loops are arranged symmetrically, so the hot legs are diametrically opposed on the RPV's circumference. Because the steam generators are elevated relative to the RPV, natural convection will circulate reactor coolant in the event of RCP malfunction. The pressurizer is equipped with a
pilot-operated relief valve Like other pressure relief valves (PRV), pilot-operated relief valves (PORV) are used for emergency relief during overpressure events (e.g., a tank gets too hot and the expanding fluid increases the pressure to dangerous levels). PORV are also c ...
which not only protects against Reactor Coolant System over-pressure, it also allows manual depressurization in the case of a total loss of feedwater.


Secondary

Each steam generator has 13,102
Inconel Inconel is a registered trademark of Special Metals Corporation for a family of austenitic nickel-chromium-based superalloys. Inconel alloys are oxidation-corrosion-resistant materials well suited for service in extreme environments subjected t ...
690 tubes; this material improves resistance to stress corrosion cracking compared to the Inconel 600 used in prior designs. Like the late-evolution System 80+ design, the steam generator design incorporates an integral feedwater economizer, which pre-heats feedwater before it is introduced into the SG. Compared with the OPR-1000 design, the steam generator features a larger secondary feedwater inventory, extending the dry-out time and affording more time for manual operator intervention, should it be needed. The design tube plugging margin is 10%, meaning the unit can operate at full power with up to 10% of the SG tubes plugged. Each of the two main steam lines from the steam generator contain five safety valves, a main steam relief valve and one
isolation valve An isolation valve is a valve in a fluid handling system that stops the flow of process media to a given location, usually for maintenance or safety purposes. They can also be used to provide flow logic (selecting one flow path versus another), an ...
.


APR+

The APR-1400 has been further developed into the APR+ design, which received its official type certification on 14 August 2014 after seven years in development. The reactor design features improved safety and among others "a core damage frequency an entire order of magnitude lower than that calculated for the APR1400 design that it supplants". The APR+ core uses 257 fuel assemblies (16 more than APR-1400) to increase output to 1550 MW gross electricity. Certain safety features, such as backup generators, have been increased from two to four independent, redundant systems.


See also

*
Nuclear power in South Korea Nuclear power is a major power source in South Korea, providing 29% of the country's electricity. The total electrical generation capacity of the nuclear power plants of South Korea is 20.5  GWe from 23 reactors, equivalent to 22% of South K ...
* Nuclear power in the United Arab Emirates *
Nuclear power in Poland Poland currently operates a single research reactor, Maria. It has no operational nuclear reactors for power production, but is to start construction of a plant with three Westinghouse AP1000 reactors in 2026, and is also intending to build small ...


References


External links

* * * * * {{Nuclear fission reactors Nuclear reactors Nuclear power reactor types Pressurized water reactors