Understanding Nickel and Jacketed Reactors

Well, it’s come to this debate, which means that you’ve either been working with reactors for a while, or you’re taking a major step within your company to adopt reactor technology of some sort. In the case of the former, I asked that you kindly indulge my brief moment of mild pedantry in just talking a little bit about the concept of reactors as a whole before extolling the virtues of nickel reactor or jacketed reactor.

Let’s Define a Reactor

First of all, let’s define a reactor, because the traditional notion of nuclear reactors is by no means the only, nor most common scenario. Reactors are really any engineered system in which substances are induced to react by outside forces, or their own contained interactivity by nature. Reactors are used in the manufacture of a great many things, including spirits and beers, pharmaceuticals, industrial solvents, really, just about anything you can imagine might have a reactor stage in its production if it’s in any way synthesized. Heck, your car’s engine, and internal combustion apparatus, is in fact a type of reactor, albeit not an airtight one for obvious reasons.

And, yes, nuclear power utilizes a type of reactor, though far from the oldest design called a reactor, and it’s really a small percentage of the number of reactors in the world. That said, I do want to point out that nuclear energy has an unfair reputation, entirely. Nuclear energy is actually quite safe when handled correctly, and the reactors and supporting systems are manufactured of proper safety quality and cost standards. The most infamous nuclear incident, that of Chernobyl, was the result of mismanagement and for funding, alongside some human error in an earlier time of nuclear power. Fukushima was a natural disaster, and that does happen sometimes, etc. Nuclear energy is the only location-independent power source with theoretically-full-control over the waste and emissions.

Nickel Reactors

Nickel reactors do not use nickel as a reactive material, but rather utilize it in the metallurgy of their construction. Nickel is one of the least-reactive metals, and is also bountiful and reasonably strong when blended with other sources of metal. This makes it very capable of standing up to thermal expansion, capable of handling heat and pressure, and is a highly unlikely to react with the materials being utilized in the reaction process. This makes it long-lasting and very safe and easy to maintain, generally-speaking. Nickel reactors are also generally inexpensive, and while there does exist a rather more impressive alloy, which we will discuss in our next piece, for affordability, it’s hard to beat it.

Jacketed Reactor

Jacketed reactors utilize one or more additional layers of surrounded housing encasing the main reactor structure, primarily with the pipes and pressure vessels. Between this extra housing and the internal core, either an inert gas or pure vacuum is employed, helping to further abate environmental thermal fluctuations, reduce bleed out of heat or intake of heat by the reaction, and provide an extra layer of safety should any part of the apparatus be compromised.

Jacketed reactors are not mutually exclusive to nickel reactors, nor really any other type of metallurgy involved. It is simply and architectural approach versus a metallurgical one, and these two can be used in tandem, and often are, to great effect.