Nuclear Power Demonstrator
| Nuclear Power Demonstration | |
|---|---|
 Location of Nuclear Power Demonstration
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| Country | Canada |
| Location | Rolphton, Ontario (200 km northwest of Ottawa, Ontario) |
| Coordinates | 46°11′12″N 77°39′28″W / 46.18667°N 77.65778°WCoordinates: 46°11′12″N 77°39′28″W / 46.18667°N 77.65778°W |
| Commission date | 1962 |
| Decommission date | 1987 |
| Owner(s) | Atomic Energy of Canada Limited |
| Operator(s) | Ontario Hydro |
| Nuclear power station | |
| Reactor type | CANDU (prototype) |
| Power generation | |
| Nameplate capacity | 19.5 MW |
Nuclear Power Demonstration (or NPD) was the first Canadian nuclear power reactor, and the prototype for the CANDU reactor design. Built by Canadian General Electric (now GE Canada), in partnership with Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) and Ontario Hydro (now Ontario Power Generation), it consisted of a single 22 MWe pressurized heavy water reactor (PHWR) unit located in Rolphton, Ontario, not far from AECL's Chalk River Laboratories. NPD was owned by AECL and operated by Ontario Hydro.
The NPD was the prototype and proving ground for research and development that led to commercial application of the CANDU system for generating electric power from a nuclear plant using natural uranium fuel, heavy water moderator and coolant in a pressure tube configuration with on-power refuelling.
The NPD station was located on the west bank of the Ottawa River about 140 miles upstream from the City of Ottawa. It was situated close by the AECL research establishment at Chalk River and the HEPC hydro generating station at Des Joachims, Ontario. It had a maximum continuous output of 22 MW(e), which gave a net station output of 19.5 MW(e).
The reactor was fueled with 40 000 lb of UO2 in the form of ceramic pellets sheathed in Zircaloy-2 tubes. The fuel was subdivided into nine bundles per channel, and fuel changing was designed to be carried out on power by remotely operated machines which push a fresh bundle in one end of the channel and remove the spent bundle from the other end, a design feature that carried through to the later CANDU products.
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