Техническое чтение для энергетиков. Бухарова Г.П. - 17 стр.

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19
numerous ways to harness the sun. Using semiconductors, scientists, for example,
have transformed solar energy into electric energy.
ATOMIC ENERGY
A man trying to see a single atom is like a man trying to see a single drop of
water in the sea while he is flying high above it. He will see the sea made up of a
great many drops of water but he certainly will not be able to see a single drop. By
the way, there are so many atoms in the drop of water that if one could count one
atom a second, day and night, it would take one hundred milliard years. But that is
certainly impossible.
Man has, however, learned the secret of the atom. He has learned to split atoms
in order to get great quantities of energy. At present, coal is one of the most important
fuel and our basic source of energy. It is quite possible that some day coal and other
fuel may be replaced by atomic energy. Atomic energy replacing the present sources
of energy, the latter will find various new applications.
The nuclear reactor is one of the most reliable "furnaces" producing atomic
energy. Being used to produce energy, the reactor produces it in the form of heat. In
other words, atoms splitting in the reactor, heat is developed. Gas, water, melted
metals, and some other liquids circulating through the reactor carry that heat away.
The heat may be carried to pipes of the steam generator containing water. The
resulting steam drives a turbine, the turbine in its turn driving an electric generator.
So we see that a nuclear power-station is like any other power-station but the familiar
coal-burning furnace is replaced by a nuclear one, that is the reactor supplies energy
to the turbines. By the way, a ton of uranium (nuclear fuel) can give us as much
energy as 2.5 to 3 million tons of coal.
The first industrial nuclear power-station in the world was constructed in
Obninsk not far from Moscow in 1954. It is of high capacity and has already been
working for many years. One may mention here that the station in question was put
into operation two years earlier than the British one and three and a half years earlier
than the American nuclear power-stations.
A number of nuclear power-stations have been put into operation since 1954.
The Beloyarskaya nuclear power-station named after academician Kurchatov may
serve as an example of the peaceful use of atomic energy in the USSR.
Soviet scientists and engineers achieved a nuclear superheating of steam directly
in the reactor itself before steam is carried into the turbine. It is certainly an important
contribution to nuclear engineering achieved for the first time in the world.
We might mention here another important achievement, that is, the first nuclear
installation where thermal energy generated in the reactor is transformed directly into
electrical energy.
Speaking of the peaceful use of atomic energy it is also necessary to mention
our nuclear ice-breakers. "Lenin" is the world's first ice-breaker with a nuclear
installation. Its machine installation is of a steam turbine type, the steam being
produced by three reactors and six steam generators. This ice-breaker was followed

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