>>1771936>I'm interested but I have no clue what this combination of words meansThere are few enough nuclear plants in the US that the preferred mode of operation is 100% all the time. You run the plant balls to the wall. Overnight baseload demand is low enough that as you shutdown the peaking units, the nuclear units can continue to run. However, when you get to a France type situation where nuclear is a significant portion of their electrical generation, overnight demand is too low to keep all the plants at 100%. You have three options: remain at full power but dump secondary side steam to the heat sink rather than make power, adjust the plant with the control rods to reduce the power production rate (make less steam to the turbine), or shut the reactor down. In France, they shut some down over the weekend.
>more words on PWR (pressurized water reactor) operationA PWR is delayed critical on soluble boron in the primary water. That means the control rods are completely out of the core. However, if electrical demand drops, and you want the nuclear unit to follow that demand, you can start to insert the some or all of the control rods partially into the core to slow the reaction rate. B&W had 8-bit control (256 insertion steps) baked into their PWR design 60 odd years ago when it looked like the US would build so many reactors, we would be in a France type situation.
>extra knowledge for no added charge: B = boilingBWRs always use control rods because you can't have anything dissolved in the primary water because a) it boils and b) it would destroy the turbine.
