RBMK

Rare card · No. 33546

The RBMK (Russian: РБМК, реактор большой мощности канальный, romanized: reaktor bolshoy moshchnosti kanalnyy, lit. 'high-power channel-type reactor') is a class of graphite-moderated nuclear power reactor designed and built by the Soviet Union. It is somewhat like a boiling water reactor as water boils in the pressure tubes. It is one of two power reactor types to enter serial production in the Soviet Union during the 1970s, the other being the VVER reactor. The name refers to its design where instead of a large steel pressure vessel surrounding the entire core, the core is surrounded by a cylindrical annular steel tank inside a concrete vault and each fuel assembly is enclosed in an individual 8.4 cm (inner) diameter pipe (called a "technological channel"). The channels also contain the coolant, and are surrounded by graphite. The RBMK is an early Generation II reactor and the oldest commercial reactor design still in wide operation. Certain aspects of the original RBMK reactor design...

Read on Wikipedia · Image Kirill Fedchenko, CC BY-SA 3.0