Zero-power reactor

A reactor, sometimes called a critical assembly, built to reach criticality at such low power, typically watts and at most a few kilowatts, that it makes no useful heat, needs little cooling and builds up little radioactivity. It is used to check that a core's physics matches its calculations: how much fuel it takes to go critical, how much the control rods are worth and how reactivity changes with temperature. Reaching criticality in a zero-power reactor is a real milestone, but it produces no electricity and says little about how a power reactor of the same design will handle heat, materials or years of operation.

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concept:zero-power-reactor

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