How Nuclear Power Works

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Introduction to How Nuclear Power Works

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Tricastin Nuclear Power Plant is one of 59 French plants that provide 75 percent of the country's electricity.

When you hear the words "nuclear power," different images may flicker through your mind: concrete coolant towers emitting torrents of steam, a mushroom cloud rising high into the sky or even Homer Simpson asleep at the control panel.

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Some people praise the technology as a low-cost, low-emission alternative to fossil fuels, while others stress the negative impact of nuclear waste and accidents such as Three Mile Island and Chernobyl. There's a lot of discussion out there about nuclear power's role in our lives, but what's going on at the heart of these power plants?

As of July 2008, there were more than 430 operating nuclear power plants and, together, they provided about 15 percent of the world's electricity in 2007. Of these 31 countries, some depend more on nuclear power than others. For instance, in France about 77 percent of the country's electricity comes from nuclear power [source: NEI]. Lithuania comes in second, with an impressive 65 percent. In the United States, 104 nuclear power plants supply 20 percent of the electricity overall, with some states benefiting more than others.

Despite all the cosmic energy that the word "nuclear" invokes, power plants that depend on atomic energy don't operate that differently from a typical coal-burning power plant. Both heat water into pressurized steam, which drives a turbine generator. The key difference between the two plants is the method of heating the water. While older plants burn fossil fuels, nuclear plants depend on the heat that occurs during nuclear fission, when one atom splits into two.

In this article, we'll examine the process of fission, look at what goes on inside and outside a nuclear power plant and discuss some of the pros and cons of nuclear power.

Nuclear Fission

Everyone from comic book writers to theoretical physicists have characterized the splitting of the atom as the ultimate act of man playing God, so it's easy to forget that nuclear fission happens naturally every day. Uranium, for example, constantly undergoes spontaneous fission very slowly. This is why the element emits radiation, and why it's a natural choice for the induced fission that nuclear power plants require.

Uranium is a common element on Earth. It's been around since the planet formed. Uranium-238 (U-238) has an extremely long half-life (the time it takes for half its atoms to decay) of 4.5 billion years. Therefore, it's still present in fairly large quantities. U-238 makes up 99 percent of the uranium on Earth, while uranium-235 (U-235) makes up about 0.7 percent of the remaining uranium found naturally. Uranium-234 is even rarer, formed by the decay of U-238. U-238 goes through many stages of decay in its life span, eventually forming a stable isotope of lead, so U-234 is just one link in that chain.

Uranium-235 has an interesting property that makes it handy for the production of both nuclear power and nuclear bombs. U-235 decays naturally, just as U-238 does, by alpha radiation: It throws off an alpha particle, or two neutrons and two protons bound together. U-235 also undergoes spontaneous fission a small percentage of the time. However, U-235 is one of the few materials that can undergo induced fission. If a free neutron runs into a U-235 nucleus, the nucleus will absorb the neutron, become unstable and split immediately. See How Nuclear Radiation Works for complete details.

The above animation shows a uranium-235 nucleus with a neutron approaching from the top. The probability of a U-235 atom capturing a neutron as it passes by is high. In fact, under reactor conditions, one neutron ejected from each fission causes another fission to occur.

As soon as the nucleus captures the neutron, it splits into two lighter atoms and throws off two or three new neutrons (the number of ejected neutrons depends on how the U-235 atom splits). The process of capturing the neutron and splitting happens very quickly, on the order of picoseconds (1x10^-12 seconds).

What about plutonium?

Uranium-235 isn't the only possible fuel for a power plant. Another fissionable material is plutonium-239. Plutonium-239 is created by bombarding U-238 with neutrons, a common occurrence in a nuclear reactor.

The splitting of an atom releases an incredible amount of heat and gamma radiation, or radiation made of high-energy photons. The two atoms that result from the fission later release beta radiation (super fast electrons) and gamma radiation of their own as well. The energy released by a single fission comes from the fact that the fission products and the neutrons, together, weigh less than the original U-235 atom. The difference in weight is converted directly to energy at a rate governed by the equation E = mc².

The decay of a single U-235 atom releases approximately 200 MeV (million electron volts). That may not seem like much, but there are a lot of uranium atoms in a pound (0.45 kg) of uranium. So many, in fact, that a pound of highly enriched uranium as used to power a nuclear submarine is equal to about a million gallons of gasoline.

However, for all of this to work, a sample of uranium must be enriched so that it contains 2 to 3 percent more U-235. Three-percent enrichment is sufficient for nuclear power plants, but weapons-grade uranium is composed of at least 90 percent U-235.

Subcriticality, Criticality and Supercriticality

When a U-235 atom splits, two or three neutrons fly off. If there are no other U-235 atoms around, then those free neutrons fly into space as neutron rays. However, if the U-235 atom is part of a mass of uranium, then there are plenty of other U-235 atoms nearby for the freewheeling neutrons to collide with. Will one or more of the free neutrons hit another U-235 atom? The answer to that question determines a nuclear reactor's status.

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A dump truck drives over the scarred earth of the Rossing Uranium Mine in Namibia.

Critical mass: If, on average, exactly one of the free neutrons from each fission hits another U-235 nucleus and causes it to split, then the mass of uranium is said to be critical. The mass will exist at a stable temperature.

Subcritical mass: If, on average, less than one of the free neutrons hits another U-235 atom, then the mass is subcritical. Eventually, induced fission will end under these conditions and your source of power along with it.

Supercritical mass: If, on average, more than one of the free neutrons hits another U-235 atom, then the mass is supercritical. This will cause the reactor to heat up.

In designing a nuclear bomb, engineers need the mass of uranium to be very supercritical so that all of the U-235 atoms in the mass split in a single microsecond. Think of it as all the kernels in a bag of popcorn popping at once, as opposed to sequentially.

In a nuclear reactor, however, the last thing you (and the rest of the world) want is all your atoms splitting at once. But the reactor core needs to be slightly supercritical so that plant operators can raise and lower the temperature of the reactor. The control rods give the operators a way to absorb free neutrons so operators can maintain the reactor at a critical level. We'll talk more about this next.

Quiz Corner

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How do engineers control the criticality of the uranium? The amount of U-235 in the mass (the level of enrichment) plays a role, as does the shape of the mass itself. If the shape of the mass is a very thin sheet, most of the free neutrons will fly off into space rather than hitting other U-235 atoms. As such, a sphere is the optimal shape, and you'd need 2 pounds (0.9 kg) of uranium-235 in it in to achieve a critical reaction. This amount is therefore referred to as the critical mass. For P-239, the critical mass is about 10 ounces (283 grams).

How do technicians control these levels? Find out on the next page.

Inside a Nuclear Power Plant

To turn nuclear fission into electrical energy, the first step for nuclear power plant operators is to be able to control the energy given off by the enriched uranium and allow it to heat water into steam.

Enriched uranium is typically formed into inch-long (2.5-cm-long) pellets, each with approximately the same diameter as a dime. Next the pellets are arranged into long rods, and the rods are collected together into bundles. The bundles are submerged in water inside a pressure vessel. The water acts as a coolant. For the reactor to work, the submerged bundles must be slightly supercritical. Left to its own devices, the uranium would eventually overheat and melt.

To prevent overheating, control rods made of a material that absorbs neutrons are inserted into the uranium bundle using a mechanism that can raise or lower the control rods. Raising and lowering the control rods allow operators to control the rate of the nuclear reaction. When an operator wants the uranium core to produce more heat, the control rods are raised out of the uranium bundle (thus absorbing fewer neutrons). To create less heat, they are lowered into the uranium bundle. The rods can also be lowered completely into the uranium bundle to shut the reactor down in the case of an accident or to change the fuel.

The uranium bundle acts as an extremely high-energy source of heat. It heats the water and turns it to steam. The steam drives a turbine, which spins a generator to produce power. Humans have been harnessing the expansion of water into steam for hundreds of years. To learn more about the properties involved, read How Steam Technology Works.

In some nuclear power plants, the steam from the reactor goes through a secondary, intermediate heat exchanger to convert another loop of water to steam, which drives the turbine. The advantage to this design is that the radioactive water/steam never contacts the turbine. Also, in some reactors, the coolant fluid in contact with the reactor core is gas (carbon dioxide) or liquid metal (sodium, potassium); these types of reactors allow the core to be operated at higher temperatures.

Given all the radioactive elements inside a nuclear power plant, it shouldn't come as a surprise that there's a little more to a plant's outside than you'd find at a coal power plant. In the next section, we'll explore the various protective barriers between you and the atomic heart of the plant.

Outside a Nuclear Power Plant

Once you get past the reactor itself, there's very little difference between a nuclear power plant and a coal-fired or oil-fired power plant, except for the source of the heat used to create steam. But as that source can emit harmful levels of radiation, extra precautions are required.

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As you can tell by looking at this photograph of Germany's Brokdorf nuclear plant, concrete plays an important role in containing radioactive materials.

A concrete liner typically houses the reactor's pressure vessel and acts as a radiation shield. That liner, in turn, is housed within a much larger steel containment vessel. This vessel contains the reactor core, as well as the equipment plant workers use to refuel and maintain the reactor. The steel containment vessel serves as a barrier to prevent leakage of any radioactive gases or fluids from the plant.

An outer concrete building serves as the final outer layer, protecting the steel containment vessel. This concrete structure is strong enough to survive the kind of massive damage that might result from earthquakes or a crashing jet airliner. These secondary containment structures are necessary to prevent the escape of radiation/radioactive steam in the event of an accident. The absence of secondary containment structures in Russian nuclear power plants allowed radioactive material to escape in Chernobyl.

Workers in the control room at the nuclear power plant can monitor the nuclear reactor and take action if something goes wrong. Nuclear facilities also typically feature security perimeters and added personnel to help protect sensitive materials.

As you probably know, nuclear power has its share of critics, as well as its supporters. One the next page, we'll take a quick look at some of the pros and cons of splitting an atom to keep everyone's TVs and toasters running.

Pros and Cons of Nuclear Power Plants

Whether you view nuclear power as the promise for a better tomorrow or a whopping down payment on a mutant-filled apocalypse, there's a good chance you won't be easily converted to the other side. After all, nuclear power boasts a number of advantages, as well as its share of downright depressing negatives.

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This storage facility near the site of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant currently houses nuclear waste.

As far as positives go, nuclear power's biggest advantages are tied to the simple fact that it doesn't depend on fossil fuels. Coal and natural gas power plants emit carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, contributing to climate change. With nuclear power plants, CO₂ emissions are minimal.

According to the Nuclear Energy Institute, the power produced by the world's nuclear plants would normally produce 2 billon metric tons of CO₂ per year if they depended on fossil fuels. In fact, a properly functioning nuclear power plant actually releases less radioactivity into the atmosphere than a coal-fired power plant [source: Hvistendahl]. By not depending on fossil fuels, the cost of nuclear power also isn't affected by fluctuations in oil and gas prices.

As for negatives, nuclear fuel may not produce CO₂, but it does provide its share of problems. Historically, mining and purifying uranium hasn't been a very clean process. Even transporting nuclear fuel to and from plants poses a contamination risk. And once the fuel is spent, you can't just throw it in the city dump. It's still radioactive and potentially deadly.

On average, a nuclear power plant annually generates 20 metric tons of used nuclear fuel, classified as high-level radioactive waste. When you take into account every nuclear plant on Earth, the combined total climbs to roughly 2,000 metric tons yearly [source: NEI]. All of this waste emits radiation and heat, meaning that it will eventually corrode any container and can prove lethal to nearby life forms. As if this weren't bad enough, nuclear power plants produce a great deal of low-level radioactive waste in the form of radiated parts and equipment.

Eventually spent nuclear fuel will decay to safe radioactive levels, but it takes tens of thousands of years. Even low-level radioactive waste requires centuries to reach acceptable levels. Currently, the nuclear industry lets waste cool for years before mixing it with glass and storing it in massive cooled, concrete structures. In the future, much of this waste may be transported deep underground. In the meantime, however, this waste has to be maintained, monitored and guarded to prevent the materials from falling into the wrong hands. All of these services and added materials cost money -- on top of the high costs required to build a plant.

Nuclear waste can pose a problem, and it's the result of properly functioning nuclear power plants. When something goes wrong, the situation can turn catastrophic. The Chernobyl disaster is a good recent example. In 1986, the Ukrainian nuclear reactor exploded, spewing 50 tons of radioactive material into the surrounding area, contaminating millions of acres of forest. The disaster forced the evacuation of at least 30,000 people, and eventually caused thousands to die from cancer and other illnesses [source: History Channel].

Chernobyl was poorly designed and improperly operated. While the plant required constant human attention to keep the reactor from malfunctioning, modern plants require constant supervision to keep from shutting down. Still, Chernobyl is a black eye for the nuclear power industry, often overshadowing some of the environmental advantages the technology has to offer.

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