Study of an incrementally loaded multistage flash desalination system for optimum use of sensible waste heat from nuclear power plant

SUMMARY Existing practice of nuclear desalination cogeneration incurs loss of nuclear plant power generation because it competes for live steam with nuclear plant steam turbine. Such loss is completely avoided with the nuclear desalination plant design proposed in the present study. The plant called GTHTR300 is based on a high-temperature gas reactor rated at 600 MWt. Gas turbine is used to replace steam turbine as power generator. The gas turbine converts about a half of the reactor's thermal power to electricity while rejecting the balance as sensible waste heat to be utilized in a multistage flash (MSF) plant for seawater desalination. A new MSF process scheme is proposed and optimized to efficiently match the sensible waste heat source. The new scheme increments the thermal load of the multistage heat recovery section in a number of steps as opposed to keeping it constant in the traditional MSF process. As the number of steps increases, more waste heat is utilized, and top brine temperature for peak water production is increased. Both tend to increase water yield. Operating with a similar number of stages, the new process is shown to produce 45% more water than the traditional process operating over the same temperature range. As a result, the GTHTR300 yields 56,000 m3/d water and generates 280 MWe power at constant efficiency with and without water cogeneration. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.