Friday December 10th, 2021 Jacopo Buongiorno on Nuclear Batteries: A New Way in Energy

Please Note: this meeting will start at 9:30am ET.

On December 10th, we will continue our conversation regarding approaches to meet the growing electric energy demand when Jacopo Buongiorno of MIT’s Department Nuclear Science and Engineering joins us by Zoom. Dr. Buongiorno will speak on Nuclear Batteries: A New Way in Energy. The concept of the Nuclear Battery, a standardized, factory-fabricated, road transportable, plug-and-play micro-reactor is introduced. Nuclear Batteries have the potential to provide on-demand, carbon-free, economic, resilient and safe energy for distributed heat and electricity applications in every sector of the economy. The cost targets for Nuclear Batteries in these markets are 20-50 $/MWht (6-15 $/MMBTU) and 70-100 $/MWhe for heat and electricity, respectively. He will present a parametric study of the Nuclear Battery’s levelized cost of heat and electricity, suggesting that those cost targets are well within reach. The expected cost of heat and electricity from Nuclear Batteries is expected to depend strongly on core power rating, fuel enrichment, fuel burnup, size of the onsite staff, fabrication costs and financing. Notional examples of cheap and expensive Nuclear Battery designs are provided.

Jacopo Buongiorno is the TEPCO Professor of Nuclear Science and Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and the Director of Science and Technology of the MIT Nuclear Reactor Laboratory. He teaches a variety of undergraduate and graduate courses in thermo-fluids engineering and nuclear reactor engineering. Jacopo has published 90 journal articles in the areas of reactor safety and design, two-phase flow and heat transfer, and nanofluid technology. For his research work and his teaching at MIT he won several awards, among which the ANS Outstanding Teacher Award (2019), the MIT MacVicar Faculty Fellowship (2014), the ANS Landis Young Member Engineering Achievement Award (2011), the ASME Heat Transfer Best Paper Award (2008), and the ANS Mark Mills Award (2001). Jacopo is the Director of the Center for Advanced Nuclear Energy Systems (CANES). In 2016-2018 he led the MIT study on the Future of Nuclear Energy in a Carbon-Constrained World. Jacopo is a consultant for the nuclear industry in the area of reactor thermal-hydraulics, and a member of the Accrediting Board of the National Academy of Nuclear Training. He is also a member of the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board (SEAB) Space Working Group, a Fellow of the American Nuclear Society (including service on its Special Committee on Fukushima in 2011-2012), a member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, past member of the Naval Studies Board (2017-2019), and a participant in the Defense Science Study Group (2014-2015).

Dr. Buongiorno has provided another paper:

Nuclear Batteries - Energies-14-04385 and a copy of the slides is also available:

Nuclear Batteries, a New Way in Energy (JB 12-10-21) .