Nova - The Nuclear Option

[airdvr 198]

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/tech/the-nuclear-option.html

Fascinating doc on the new nuclear reactors being developed. Even without admitting that climate change is real we're going to need this power in the future so you can drive your Teslas.

It's also a stark reminder of the time wasted by the liberals in the 70's and 80's. Hollywood, the Democrats, and over-regulation strangled nuke power. Hard to imagine where we'd be now had we not wasted the last 2 decades.

Please don't dent the planet.

Destinations by Roxanne

[lnx 0]

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-nuclear-power-can-stop-global-warming/

Another interesting take on nuclear power.

I'd say the skepticism and heavy regulation was warranted a couple of decades ago - Chernobyl showed us what an accident at the early generation nuclear plants could do. Times have changed, however, and with climate change being one of the most pressing concerns of our time, nuclear seems like a very good option.

Unfortunately it still has a very bad reputation.

[wolfriverjoe 1,346]

Where would we be?

Likely we'd have some area of the country that was uninhabitable, not unlike Chernobyl.

Both Chernobyl and Three Mile Island were very serious.
TMI didn't release much radiation, but the hydrogen bubble could have easily exploded, blowing the top off of the reactor. They also came fairly close to a meltdown. Had either of those happened, parts of southeastern PA would still be a wasteland.

The really "fun" part is that both of them were human error. You can design the best reactor and support systems in the world, but you still have people running them.

There were also a number of issues with construction of some of the plants. Corners were cut by the construction companies in the name of profit. Some of those could have had serious consequences.

I'm not against nuclear power in general, but it has to be done right. And it wasn't always being done right back in the 70s.

"There are NO situations which do not call for a French Maid outfit." Lucky McSwervy

"~ya don't GET old by being weak & stupid!" - Airtwardo

[gowlerk 1,916]

Nuclear will be a lot more tempting once we can find a place to keep the spent fuel safe for the 10s of thousands of years needed. No one will allow it anywhere. Maybe in your neighbourhood?

Always remember the brave children who died defending your right to bear arms. Freedom is not free.

[airdvr 198]

gowlerk

Nuclear will be a lot more tempting once we can find a place to keep the spent fuel safe for the 10s of thousands of years needed. No one will allow it anywhere. Maybe in your neighbourhood?

New designs can use depleted uranium. We have enough of it to power the US for 750 years.

Quote

Likely we'd have some area of the country that was uninhabitable, not unlike Chernobyl

There are 100 reactors already running here. I think that statement is a bit overly dramatic. New designs don't use water. The nuke accidents always come back to using water to cool the rods.

Here's a hint; if you people are as concerned about climate change as you say you are we won't be able to have a worldwide impact without nuclear power. Wind and solar won't do it.

Please don't dent the planet.

Destinations by Roxanne

[nolhtairt 0]

One thing to keep in mind when designing and building a nuclear power plant... It takes more than a decade, two even... and billions of dollars. That includes the economic impact and enviromental impact and liberal trash anti-nuclear opponents. Cost overruns are a serious issue as well, with labor costs continuing to rise on nuke plant construction.

[PhreeZone 15]

I have always been enamored by the design of a Pebble Bed Reactor since it allows for an inert gas cooled cycle and less fuel needs to be stored onsite and refueling cycles do not require a full shutdown of the facility. I have been onsite at a few plants around the US and I've seen how outdated our technology is and how desperate it is for upgrading. INL is a great facility if you have an interest in Nuclear or SCADA systems I would recommend seeing it if you get the chance. Middle of nowhere but its still interesting.

Issue that I did not see in the entire show was the disposal of the spent rods. Right now we have a serious issue on the accumulation of spent and depleted waste that needs to have a long term storage solution implemented. Terrapower makes some interesting claims on their usage of the spent rods but they are still yet to fire up and use anything so I'll reserve judgement until they go operational.. Outdoor storage in KY is not going to be a great solution for the next 3000 years. Yucca Mountain is stalled again despite having been signed off and a lot of the work is completed. Massive amounts of money have been dropped into the site but for various political reasons the project keeps getting stopped. Another issue is Yucca will only hold the amount of materials that have currently been produced and will run out of expansion room within the next two decades or so. The next site needs to be identified and construction started soon to avoid this same issue again in 20-30 years. Transportation of spent materials to the site is going to be a political nightmare since every town on the path is going to have a large population that gets freaked out over the thought of a cask of materials crashing and spilling out in their town.

One issue that is occurring on the plants under construction in Georgia and South Carolina is how they are being funded. Southern Energy was able to get the state regulators to pass a exemption that they were allowed to raise all the rates for current generation to be able to fund the construction but at each overrun or delay the costs went up further for consumers. At one point the rates were expected to raise by almost 40% over current prices and it was not expected to decrease until the new plants were fully paid off in 30-50 years. The US Government is actually the backer of the loans for the construction since its deemed to risky for institutional loaners to front since the construction really is an open ended check until its done and might risk the financial heath of a bank to be the sole investor into a nuke plant.

Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

[gowlerk 1,916]

Quote

New designs can use depleted uranium. We have enough of it to power the US for 750 years.

You are talking about a so far theoretical design called a traveling wave reactor. An interesting concept, and one that is being actively pursued by serious people with serious money.

No one has yet built one, and many experts say that no one will in the foreseeable future. I am not against nuclear power and I agree with you that opposition to it is largely overblown.
But there is little reason to believe that TRWs will be the game changer they are touted to be.

Always remember the brave children who died defending your right to bear arms. Freedom is not free.

[normiss 622]

We just need more Homers.

[billvon 2,406]

>New designs can use depleted uranium.

No existing design can use depleted uranium. There have been a few experiments; that's it.

>There are 100 reactors already running here. I think that statement is a bit overly
>dramatic. New designs don't use water. The nuke accidents always come back to
>using water to cool the rods.

All existing (or even available for purchase) systems use water as a coolant. There are some experimental designs that use liquid metal, or liquid sodium, or liquid salts. Needless to say, there are even more safety concerns with those coolants. Another design uses helium to cool graphite fuel assemblies. The risk there is that if there is a LOCA (loss of coolant accident) and air touches the fuel assemblies - they will burn like the coal they (basically) are.

[billvon 2,406]

>I'm not against nuclear power in general, but it has to be done right. And it
>wasn't always being done right back in the 70s.

Agreed there. There are some available designs out there that are relatively reliable (like the GE AP series) but the reason they're relatively reliable is that they are based on lessons we've learned from other disasters and mishaps. (And Chernobyl, Fukushima and TMI are just the most visible ones.)

Chernobyl - don't design reactors with positive void coefficients

Fukushima - have foolproof control power backup

Three mile island - have better feedback for operators, don't allow certain operations during/right after a scram and have better operator training

[Bob_Church 7]

I'm not against nuclear energy but there is something that I'm very curious about but can't find an answer to. That is, "how much coal does it take to run a nuclear power plant?"
When they shut down the uranium enrichment plant in nearby Piketon it devastated the coal industry here. There were at least three coal mines dedicated to running two power plants that would supply electricity to Piketon.
The problem is that this is woven into so many other things that I can't tell what is what. US produced coal was already under attack so I can't say which mines closed due to that or to Piketon's closing. And I don't know how much of the HEU that Piketon made was for power plants and how much for weapons.
But if anyone here knows I'd appreciate finding out.

[PhreeZone 15]

A Nuclear plant usually has a very small secondary generation facility to be able to run things if the main reactor goes offline. Last two facilities that I was at were using LNG to be able to run small on site plants for standby generation. LNG is considered to be a better option than coal since it can be trucked in on as needed basis and not need an entire rail facility to be maintained to be able to accept additional fuel supplies.

Piketon did not have have a correlation to the local mines other than the power demands. Piketon produced a lot more weapon grade than for refueling. There is a large difference in the level of refining needed to get to a weapons grade and they were one of the few facilities that were producing HEU at weapons grade.

Coal has not been "under attack" except by consumers asking for cheaper energy sources. Fracking destroyed coal more than anything else.

Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com