The technical accomplishments of the Clinch River Breeder Reactor Plant project

This paper provides a technical discussion of some key aspects of the current design of the Clinch River Breeder Reactor Plant (CRBRP), and explains how it has been updated to reflect technical developments which have occurred since the project was first authorized by Congress in 1972. Design innovations not yet incorporated in similar foreign LMFBR demonstration plants are identified. Its purpose is to provide engineering and operating experience necessary to further development, transfer, and eventual deployment of breeder reactors in the United States. Design of the Project has proceeded in full recognition of the need for developing information and data applicable to larger follow-on plants, such as high-temperature design criteria, which will assure reliable performance of LMFBR systems and components at high temperatures, and which take into account the effects of fast flux irradiations on the structural materials.