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Steam generators are heat exchangers used to convert water into steam from heat produced in a nuclear reactor core. They are used in pressurized water reactors between the primary and secondary coolant loops.

In commercial power plants steam generators can measure up to 70 feet in height and weigh as much as 800 tons. Each steam generator can contain anywhere from 3,000 to 16,000 tubes, each about three-quarters of an inch in diameter. Inside the steam generators, water is pumped under high pressure, to prevent it from boiling, through tubing passing through the nuclear reactor core. Steam Turbine Power Generators. This is referred to as the primary loop. That water flowing through the inside of the tubes then passes through heat-exchanger in the steam generator to produce steam in the secondary loop that is delivered to the turbines to make electricity. The steam is subsequently condensed via cooled water from the ternary loop and returned to the steam generator to be heated once again. The cooling water is itself recirculated to cooling towers where it sheds waste heat before returning to condense more steam. This is the most common way to extract usable energy from a controlled nuclear reaction.