Education and Training Series #5: VERY HIGH TEMPERATURE REACTOR SYSTEMS
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
Among the six Generation IV concepts eventually selected for international cooperative development, the Very High Temperature Reactor (VHTR) was seen as an early favorite among many of the members. Indeed, among the seven original members of the VHTR System Arrangement (SA), three had already operated or tested high temperature gas-cooled reactors. The accession of the People’s Republic of China to the VHTR SA in 2008 brought that number to five. This presentation will describe how the continued cooperative development of the VHTR concept as a Generation IV system will deliver on nuclear energy’s promises of sustainable, economic, safe, reliable and proliferation resistant power and energy supply.
Presentation made during the webinar
Meet the presenter
Carl Sink has been working for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) for 24 years in various roles. Currently a Program Manager for Advanced Reactor Deployment within the Office of Nuclear Energy, he is responsible for coordinating cooperative research, development and demonstration projects conducted by DOE national laboratories and U.S. nuclear industry partners. Since 2004 he has been closely associated with the Next Generation Nuclear Plant Project, the DOE initiative to develop and demonstrate a high temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTGR). From 2006 through 2009 he was the program manager for the Nuclear Hydrogen Initiative, coordinating DOE efforts to develop high temperature water-splitting technologies to take advantage of HTGR outlet temperatures. Within GIF, Mr. Sink has served on the VHTR System Steering Committee since 2008, and currently chairs that group. He holds a Masters Degree in Engineering Management from the Catholic University of America, and is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy. Before joining the DOE, Mr. Sink spent nine years as a qualified Nuclear Engineering Officer in the United States Navy, with reactor operations assignments in a nuclear powered cruiser and a nuclear powered aircraft carrier.