Nuclear plant - part 2

This post will be mostly on the energy harvesting component that helps turning energy (in form of heat) into electricity. In order to fully understood the process, one needs to see the big picture.

Image: A simple chematic diagram of a nuclear plant

1. The chain-reaction of uranium isotope occurs in the reactor, where heat will be released due to the fission / splitting process.

Control rods are made of materials like cadium and boron which are used to control the speed of atom fission process.

2. Heat is being transfered into heat exchanger, where water is being turned into steam. All these process occurs inside a reinforced concrete containment structure to as a safety precaution to prevent any spills of uranium or explosion to ever coming outside.

3. As water being turned into steam, it will be flowed to the turbine where it will moves the turbine, where the generator will produces electricity to power up the city.

4. As the steam returned, it will pass through a condenser where the steam will be cooled down using the cooling tower, turning the steam into water and sent back to the heat exchanger to be heated by the energy produced by the reactor.

All this process helps to turn the energy produced by the atom fission of uranium into electricity that can power up almost a million houses. It is said that nuclear power plants is quite environmental friendly and stable. This is due the fact that it only requires little amount of fuel to produces a huge amount of energy while it doesn't emits CO2.

Image: Lifecycle of CO2 emissions, source hitachi.com