Education and Training Series #10: Lead-cooled Fast Reactor - LFR
Part of a webinar series hosted by the GIF Education and Training Working Group since 2016.
Who should attend?
Policymakers, industry professionals, regulators, researchers, students, the general public.
About the "GIF Education and Training" Webinars
These webinars, organised by the GIF Education and Training Working Group are streamed live monthly. The recordings and slide decks are accessible after the webinar on this website. These webinars cover a very broad range of technical and policy related topics. At the end of 2023 they have been viewed by more than 15000 people (approximately half of the views during the live streams and the other half views being of the archives on the public GIF website). In total, the GIF webinars have reached Generation IV enthusiasts, scientists, and engineers in more than 80 countries.
These webinars are organised and hosted by the GIF Education and Training Working Group (ETWG).
About this Webinar
The Lead-cooled Fast Reactor (LFR) is characterized by a fast neutron spectrum; a liquid coolant with a very high margin to boiling and relatively inert interaction with air or water; and design features that capitalize on these attributes. As with other fast spectrum reactors, the LFR offers fuel cycle options that greatly enhance resource utilization and sustainability. LFR concepts offer great potential in terms of safety, simplification, proliferation resistance and the economic performance. The webinar presents background on fast reactor physics, the historical development and present status of LFR technology and the main characteristics of LFR concepts under current consideration.
Presentation made during the webinar
Meet the presenter
Professor Craig Smith, Research Professor at the Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, CA, USA, is a nuclear engineer with broad experience in nuclear energy technology, radiation detection and information science. His previous employment includes a career at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) where he led the Fission Energy and System Safety Program. Beginning in 2004, he served as the LLNL Chair Professor at the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) in Monterey, CA. After retiring from LLNL, he assumed his current position as Research Professor of Physics at NPS. He has published several articles, papers and book chapters on topics related to the Lead-cooled Fast Reactor, and he serves as the US observer representative to the GIF Provisional System Steering Committee for the Lead-cooled Fast Reactor. He earned his Ph.D. in Nuclear Science and Engineering from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in 1975, and is a Fellow of the American Nuclear Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.