RR have a good background in this tech, having manufactured the reactors that power the UK's nuclear deterrent: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolls-Royce_PWR
Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors by 2029
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Re: Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors by 2029
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yep, and nuclear is the only near-infinite source of energy.
Forgive me if this is a worn trope, but I've read somewhere that the upper bound on what we can do with nuclear energy is not how much we can produce, but what we can do with the leftovers ... as more and more people use nuclear power we're going to produce more and more nuclear waste, and there isn't really any answer as to what we can do with that. There are plenty of fantastic "ideas" as to what can be done, but i…
If literally all the electricity ever produced by the human waste had been produced by current generation nuclear technologies, there would be a small hill of high-level nuclear waste somewhere. It wouldn't be an issue except locally where it was stored.
To believe that is a problem is to not have grappled with just how big the world is and how much of it is uninhabitable to humans already. The human population is concentrated in an absurdly small footprint in major cities and fertile belts compared to the size of the planet. The area the waste would sterilise would be a non-issue.
I dunno. What do you want to be solved? If we call it poisonous instead of radioactive would you be happy? There are literally poisonous lakes out there and nobody cares much. One more doesn't matter. The only interesting thing about nuclear waste is we use a different word to describe the same outcomes. The outcomes don't seem that dangerous in the big picture.
Re: Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors by 2029
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
It'd probably need to replenish the liquid (e.g. water) used for reactor cooling/energy extraction.
I don't know about the thermal efficiency of a small nuclear reactor, but I imagine you could probably make that a closed loop system. Just as you would on an internal combustion engine, with a radiator to cool/condense the heated coolant.
Even in an ICE, you have to replenish/change the oil and cooling fluid; I'd expect a closed-loop small nuclear reactor to be similar in this regard. Still, replenishing something every couple months is much better than refueling or recharging.
Re: Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors by 2029
#74Earlier quoted context omitted.
Forgive me if this is a worn trope, but I've read somewhere that the upper bound on what we can do with nuclear energy is not how much we can produce, but what we can do with the leftovers ... as more and more people use nuclear power we're going to produce more and more nuclear waste, and there isn't really any answer as to what we can do with that. There are plenty of fantastic "ideas" as to what can be done, but i…
If literally all the electricity ever produced by the human waste had been produced by current generation nuclear technologies, there would be a small hill of high-level nuclear waste somewhere. It wouldn't be an issue except locally where it was stored. To believe that is a problem is to not have grappled with just how big the world is and how much of it is uninhabitable to humans already. The human population is co…
Yeah man, I dunno either ... I think "poisonous" is understating it somewhat. We're talking about substances that will remain toxic for thousands of years, and are quite happy to go everywhere they can if there is some issue with containment.
I appreciate that you have a conviction that this is a problem, but you're coming across a bit hand-wavy in your arguments. I'd prefer to see concrete solutions (and I don't mean nuclear waste encased in concrete) than rhetoric as a means to address my concerns.
Re: Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors by 2029
#75Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yep, and nuclear is the only near-infinite source of energy.
I'm always baffled by such statements. Can you explain in which way solar is not a "near-infinite source of energy"? I mean... there are without doubt technical challenges and all that (but arguably less technical challenges than to do the same with nuclear), but there really is no relevant limit to the deployment of solar cells if you include things like large-scale installations in the desert.
The solar panels do have to be fabricated. That probably doesn't have the same scaling potential as nuclear given how much power/m2 nuclear can reach.
Also, at a guess the energy in solar panels drop with the square of distance to the sun. It is unlikely to be a good choice for interstellar travel if 'advance[ing] as a species' heads in the more fantastic directions.
Re: Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors by 2029
#76I long said that "mini" reactors don't make sense when 1.7GW reactor and a mini one both have dramatic minimal cost for a single unit, initial startup cost, and operational costs.
Only if mini-reactor gets cheaper than the coal plant, can they get competitive.
Re: Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors by 2029
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
TerraPower [1] seem to have a good alternative with its Traveling Wave Reactor. It can be run on nuclear waste we already have and provide energy to 10bln people with US per capita power consumption for basically eternity. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TerraPower
Always be wary of grandiose claims like this that amount as much to facts as to marketing material.
If it wasn‘t for Bill Gates I‘d be much more sceptical about it, but he‘s a huge advertiser which gives hope.
Re: Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors by 2029
#78I long said that "mini" reactors don't make sense when 1.7GW reactor and a mini one both have dramatic minimal cost for a single unit, initial startup cost, and operational costs. Only if mini-reactor gets cheaper than the coal plant, can they get competitive.
On the other hand the huge projects like Hinkley Point C are so big they might never come to fruition.
If Rolls Royce can get good at building these ractors they could be making them quickly and cheaply enough to make a big difference.
Re: Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors by 2029
#79Sure why not, but let us not get carried away and think THIS is the solution to global warming. It is unproven, it will be too late, and not scale up quick enough. By unproven I mean that the economics of it is unproven. We have no proof that SMR will be cheaper than large reactors. The article points this out as well. By late I mean at current fast pace of development a lot of will happen with wind and solar in the…
If wind, solar and storage have made these plants obsolete in ten years then that's fine. Nobody will lose any sleep over that.
Most likely though it won't, then we are stuck relying on a couple of unproven large reactors.
Re: Rolls-Royce plans mini nuclear reactors by 2029
#80Having worked in the industry, I like seeing companies pledging to get involved with nuclear power.
However, there is a dearth of people experienced with the design and development of new reactor technology. The development pathway of building up the supply lines, understanding the complexities of the various systems, etc. is long.
I laughed at first many years ago when I saw some new reactor designs taking 10years but it turns out in a lot of cases that's optimistic.
It's a shame, because development in the mid 20th century was a LOT faster. And the people involved moved from one new reactor design to the next, bringing valuable experience.
Much of the work force entering this industry are entirely green and need an understanding of existing reactor technologies and why some designs were made a certain way before trying to reinvent them. Looking at the development in Russia and India could be very helpful.