How Does a Nuclear Power Plant Work? Explain It to Me in Simple Terms.
Nuclear power plants are not as mysterious as people think they are. There really is nothing special about them or how they work. It’s not magic. So, how does a nuclear power plant work?
Power plants do one thing: generate power. In general, power plants use a source for energy and a method to harness and convert that energy into a desired method of power. For instance, hydroelectric power plants use the force of gravity (water falling) and convert the kinetic energy of water falling due to gravity into electrical power. The falling water spins a turbine, where the turbine spins an electricity generator.
Nuclear power plants use water to carry heat from a reactor vessel (containing the reactor core) to heat up water in steam generators (also called boilers). Pipes direct this steam into steam turbines. These steam turbines share a connection with electricity generators and the heat energy in the steam spins the turbines to create electricity. Once converted, this energy gets distributed out to the community to power our cities.
Once the energy is removed from the steam by the steam turbines, the steam condenses back into water by the condenser. The water is now called condensate. Finally, pumps send the condensate back to the steam generators. And once again, the water gets heated by the reactor vessel.
So What’s the Problem?
The “nuclear vessel” part is only used as a heat source to create the steam – nothing more. It’s a source of energy only. It’s not designed to explode, but if it gets too hot it could turn the surrounding metal into molten metal. This is a very rare situation that only happens in extreme circumstances (it has happened though). The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plants in Japan melted and exploded from hydrogen buildup from damage from a major earthquake and resulting tsunami. It was not a nuclear explosion.
The main drawback of nuclear power plants rests in the nuclear waste created by them. This waste will be radioactive for a very long time. But, this is not that big of a deal considering how much other coal plants pollute the air and surrounding water. Companies will do whatever they can to maximize profits and minimize expenses, environment be damned. Greed is the real enemy, not the technology. Damn humans.
Read more about more nuclear power plants.
And, read some other posts on this site:
- A Mol of Moles is an Infestation
- Color For Bash Scripts
- Common Words That Are Really Acronyms: CWTARA
- Do all Creatures Have Fingerprints?
- Do Penguins Live With Polar Bears?
- Figlet – An Awesome Application for ASCII Word Art