How do nuclear power plants work?
In: Engineering
Highly radioactive materials—meaning unstable atoms are placed in tight space with other unstable materials. What happens is that the more unstable atoms eject a proton or neutron which will hit something nearby. If there are other unstable atoms nearby it might cause another reaction, hitting a nucleus and splitting off a neutron or proton. Once this happens on its own, it’s called a sustained reaction (or reaching criticality). Without careful control, (meaning taking out some rods of the material when the reactions occur too much or putting in a more stable element (control rod)) this reaction could become supercritical, which becomes dangerous as the level of reactions becomes too high, heat rises and causes even more reactions and the material could melt. Anyway, the heat from the reactions warms water above the rods, to a high enough temperature to make steam. This steam builds pressure, and is only relieved through a small tube (so it holds the pressure). That pressurized steam is powerful enough to spin a turbine, which creates electricity with a magnet around the spinning part and another in a still environment. This electricity is then put through wires to a panel (transformer) that can up or lower the voltage, it is then taken through more wires to power homes.
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