RBMK
Sign in to saveThe RBMK (, РБМК; reaktor bolshoy moshchnosti kanalnyy, "high-power channel-type reactor") is a class of graphite-moderated nuclear power reactor designed and built by the Soviet Union. It is somewhat like a boiling water reactor as water boils in the pressure tubes. It is one of two power reactor types to enter serial production in the Soviet Union during the 1970s, the other being the VVER reactor. The name refers to its design where instead of a large steel pressure vessel surrounding the entire core, the core is surrounded by a cylindrical annular steel tank inside a concrete vault and eac
Key facts
- Nuclear reactor.name
- RBMK reactor class
- Nuclear reactor.image
- Smolensk Nuclear Power Plant.jpg
- Nuclear reactor.image_size
- 300px
- Nuclear reactor.caption
- View of the Smolensk Nuclear Power Plant site, with three operational RBMK-1000 reactors. A fourth reactor was cancelled before completion.
- Nuclear reactor.concept
- Graphite-moderated light water-cooled reactor
- Nuclear reactor.generation
- Generation II reactor
- Nuclear reactor.reactor_line
- RBMK
- Nuclear reactor.type_label
- Reactor types
- Nuclear reactor.type
- RBMK-1000RBMK-1500RBMKP-2400 (never built)
- Nuclear reactor.status
- 26 blocks: 7 operational 2 involved in accident 9 cancelled 9 decommissioned 4 small EGP-6 graphite moderated BWR shutdown at Bilibino Nuclear Power Plant (as of December 2025)
- Nuclear reactor.fuel_type
- NU_SEU_LEU
- Nuclear reactor.fuel_state
- Solid
- Nuclear reactor.spectrum
- Thermal
- Nuclear reactor.control
- Control rods
- Nuclear reactor.coolant
- Liquid (light water)
- Nuclear reactor.moderator
- Graphite
- Nuclear reactor.electric
- RBMK-1000: 1,000 MWeRBMK-1500: 1,500 MWeRBMKP-2400: 2,400 MWe
- Nuclear reactor.thermal
- RBMK-1000: 3,200 MWthRBMK-1500: 4,800 MWthRBMKP-2400: 6,500 MWth
via Wikipedia infobox
Article
29 sectionsContents
- Lifespan
- History
- Reactor design and performance
- Reactor vessel, moderator and shielding
- Fuel channels
- Fuel
- Control rods
- Gas circuit
- Primary coolant circuit
- ECCS
- Reactor control/supervision systems
- Containment
- Other systems
- Electrical systems
- Turbogenerators
- Design variants
- RBMK-1500
- RBMK-2000 and RBMK-3600
- RBMKP-2400
- Design flaws and safety issues
- High positive void coefficient
- Improvements since the Chernobyl accident
- Deformed graphite moderator blocks
- Further development
- List of RBMK reactors
- Other Graphite Moderated Reactors
- Known incidents
- References
- Sources and external links
The RBMK (, РБМК; reaktor bolshoy moshchnosti kanalnyy, "high-power channel-type reactor") is a class of graphite-moderated nuclear power reactor designed and built by the Soviet Union. It is somewhat like a boiling water reactor as water boils in the pressure tubes. It is one of two power reactor types to enter serial production in the Soviet Union during the 1970s, the other being the VVER reactor. The name refers to its design where instead of a large steel pressure vessel surrounding the entire core, the core is surrounded by a cylindrical annular steel tank inside a concrete vault and each fuel assembly is enclosed in an individual 8 cm (inner) diameter pipe (called a "technological channel"). The channels also contain the coolant, and are surrounded by graphite.
The RBMK is an early Generation II reactor and the oldest commercial reactor design still in wide operation. Certain aspects of the original RBMK reactor design had several shortcomings, such as the large positive void coefficient, the 'positive scram effect' of the control rods and instability at low power levels—which contributed to the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, in which an RBMK experienced an uncontrolled nuclear chain reaction, leading to a steam and hydrogen explosion, large fire, and subsequent core meltdown. Radioactive material was released over a large portion of northern and southern Europe—including Sweden, where evidence of the nuclear disaster was first registered outside of the Soviet Union, and before the Chernobyl accident was communicated by the Soviet Union to the rest of the world. The disaster prompted worldwide calls for the reactors to be completely decommissioned; however, there is still considerable reliance on RBMK facilities for power in Russia with the aggregate power of operational units at almost 7 GW of installed capacity. Most of the flaws in the design of RBMK-1000 reactors were corrected after the Chernobyl accident and a dozen reactors have since been operating without any serious incidents for over thirty years.