Ebara Elliott Energy (EEE), a global producer of turbomachinery solutions, and NuScale Power Corp. (NuScale), a provider of small modular reactor (SMR) nuclear technology, announced a collaborative research program to demonstrate and field test a commercial scale high-temperature steam compressor to integrate NuScale Power Modules (NPM) with petrochemical plants needing process heat.
Under the program, EEE and NuScale will collaborate to support the development, manufacturing, and integration of critical turbomachinery and energy-conversion systems for petrochemical plants powered by NuScale technology. The collaboration is intended to combine NuScale’s SMR technology with EEE’s expertise in steam turbines, compressors, and rotating equipment to deliver nuclear power solutions for petrochemical plants. The companies plan to develop a commercial-scale high-temperature steam compressor designed to reach temperatures of 932°F+ (500°C+).
Steam produced by the NPM will be isolated from outside facilities via an intermediate heat exchanger and subsequently raised to high temperature through the simple process of adiabatic compression.
Target completion date for the compressor is 2027. Currently, the companies are seeking candidates for the next phase of the project, field testing.
NuScale’s SMR technology is powered by its propriety NPM, a pressurized water reactor that can each generate 77 megawatts of electricity or 250 megawatts thermal (gross) and can be scaled to meet customer needs through an array of flexible configurations up to 924 MWe (12 modules) of output.
Founded in 2007, NuScale supplies nuclear energy for electrical generation, data centers, district heating, desalination, commercial-scale hydrogen production, and other process heat applications. Its designs have been certified by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
