Coupling heat storage to nuclear reactors for variable electricity output with baseload reactor operation

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Abstract Nuclear reactors produce heat and thus can couple to heat storage systems to provide dispacthable electricity while the reactor operates at full power. Six classes of heat storage technologies couple to light-water reactors with steam cycles. Firebrick Resistance-Heated Energy Storage (FIRES) converts low-price electricity into high-temperature stored heat for industry or power. FIRES and brick recuperators coupled to nuclear brayton power cycles may enable high-temperature reactors to buy electricity when prices are low and sell electricity at higher price.

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Keywords Heat storage Nuclear reactors Dispatchable electricity Firebrick resistance heated energy storage (FIRES) Nuclear air-Brayton combined cycle (NACC)

Charles Forsberg is Director and Principal Investigator of the Fluoride-salt-cooled High-temperature Reactor (FHR) project that is a joint effort of MIT, the University of California, the University of Wisconsin, and the University of New Mexico, with research interests in low-carbon nuclear-renewable energy systems. At MIT, he teaches the nuclear fuel cycle and nuclear chemical engineering classes. Before joining MIT, he was a Corporate Fellow at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and a Fellow of the American Nuclear Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Stephen Brick has worked for more than 30 years at the intersection of energy and environmental policy; his expertise includes utility regulatory policy, energy economics, energy technology assessment and air pollution control policy and economics. He is a Senior Fellow in Climate and Energy at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, a Senior Advisor to the Clean Air Task Force, and Director of System Studies for the Energy Innovation Reform Project.

Geoffrey Haratyk recently graduated with a Ph.D. in the Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering at MIT. Mr Haratyk is examining LWR economics in the context of changing electricity markets

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