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Nuclear energy is long-term sustainable

whatisnuclear.com

31–40 of 182 posts

Re: Nuclear energy is long-term sustainable

#31

1) there are no working thorium reactors 2) breeder reactors are hazardous 3) uranium seawater extraction doesn't exist 4) if uranium seawater extraction were made to work it would use enormous amounts of energy not reflected in this. The depressing truth is this shows that current uranium oxide reserves and nuclear tech could supply global energy needs for only 6 years.

(1) is like the old argument against reusable rocket boosters: there are none, so it's not possible. The US ran a thorium reactor decades ago experimentally. The "if it hasn't flown it can't fly" mentality that Elon cited in aerospace is actually pervasive across Western thought in regard to larger scale or more challenging capital intensive physical (as opposed to information) technologies. (Elon is not superhuman. He is only a "good" engineer and probably not a great manager. His superpower is rejecting conservatism and actually doing things.)

(2) is true for current generation uranium breeders that use ill-tempered working reagents like liquid sodium. The phrase "liquid sodium" combined with "power reactor" makes me want to buy a good pair of running shoes, as Derek Lowe of "Things I Won't Work With" fame might say. Thorium is a better idea. Those molten salts are nasty but they tend to stay in one place and do not spontaneously ignite when exposed to oxygen or water.

(3) true, but rendered less important due to (1). Thorium is much more abundant than uranium.

(4) also true, but probably not relevant. I think the seawater thing is a canard. Lithium for batteries from brine on the other hand is feasible, though maybe not economical given that there are vast easier to get reserves of lithium.

That being said, I think the renewables + batteries path looks much easier to deploy given other issues such as politics, up front capital requirements, and gradual scalability.

Also AFAIK a fully nuclear grid (with no fossil peakers) would require grid scale power storage to load level since nuclear is slow at load following, but not as much storage capacity as a fully renewable grid since you don't have to bridge long periods with no sun or wind.

Re: Nuclear energy is long-term sustainable

#32

1) there are no working thorium reactors 2) breeder reactors are hazardous 3) uranium seawater extraction doesn't exist 4) if uranium seawater extraction were made to work it would use enormous amounts of energy not reflected in this. The depressing truth is this shows that current uranium oxide reserves and nuclear tech could supply global energy needs for only 6 years.

Yes, those assumptions are very optimistic. If at all it would take to long to develop all this technology before it is too late.

Re: Nuclear energy is long-term sustainable

#33
post #9

It's incredibly frusturating that this isn't part of the public discourse, where are the pro-nuclear candidates? Which parties are pro-nuclear?

Ever since Chernobyl nuclear power has been voter kryptonite. Trying to explain how all these fancy terms changes the equations won't do anything for those who recoil just by mentioning the term.

Nuclear had its run and we blew it. Literally.

Re: Nuclear energy is long-term sustainable

#34
post #9

It's incredibly frusturating that this isn't part of the public discourse, where are the pro-nuclear candidates? Which parties are pro-nuclear?

It was for decades, there simply isn't anything new to discuss. We still have no solution a) where to put nuclear waste, and b) how to communicate to civilizations for the next 25000-50000 years what kind of waste that is. In Germany, the ongoing search for a permanent waste repository is going on for decades now. Funnily enough, this taxpayer's money is never calculated into the total cost of operating nuclear plant…

> a) where to put nuclear waste

https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html

> b) how to communicate to civilizations for the next 25000-50000 years what kind of waste that is.

I would solve the climate change problem first, otherwise all problems appearing in 25000 years are moot.

Re: Nuclear energy is long-term sustainable

#35
post #21

In Europe everyone knows that. Even the craziest of our "greens" who insist on complete domestic decommissioning know it. The reason a few European countries are shutting their nuclear power plants down isn't because they think they are unsustainable, but because they fear they may be targeted and attacked. They currently view them as the combination of a sitting duck and a powder keg.

Plus, you know, storing the waste for thousands of years without a good place to do so. Payed for by the public.

A lot of the fuel can be recycled and doesn't need to be stored for thousands of years. Storing the remainder underground is mostly a one-off cost except for some monitoring. It's a solved problem and only public misconceptions about tectonics and radioactivity are holding it back.

Re: Nuclear energy is long-term sustainable

#36
post #23

"However, billion-year sustainability does require advances in seawater uranium extraction..." This seems like a HUGE understatement. The calculations for the billion-year sustainability basically assume we have extracted every single bit of uranium from seawater. We have demonstrated extracting uranium from seawater [0] using plastic fibers with a compound that attracts the uranium+oxygen ions. But this would basica…

> But this would basically require pumping all of the worlds oceans through these fibers and continually extracting. Yes, and? What’s the problem here? Billion years is a plenty of time to pump all ocean water through filters. The crucial fact here is that you only need to pump through and filter as much as you need, which is much less than millions of tons of total uranium in seawater.

Pumping the water uses energy, which changes the whole equation.

Re: Nuclear energy is long-term sustainable

#37

In Europe everyone knows that. Even the craziest of our "greens" who insist on complete domestic decommissioning know it. The reason a few European countries are shutting their nuclear power plants down isn't because they think they are unsustainable, but because they fear they may be targeted and attacked. They currently view them as the combination of a sitting duck and a powder keg.

Germany, Luxembourg, Portugal, Denmark and Austria recently issued a statement objecting to nuclear being classified as an environmentally sustainable source of power. But, that statement was being issued by an EU commision. So, it sounds to me like Europe is not a bloc on this issue.

Source: https://www.dw.com/en/eu-states-split-on-classifying-nuclear...

Re: Nuclear energy is long-term sustainable

#38
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was for decades, there simply isn't anything new to discuss. We still have no solution a) where to put nuclear waste, and b) how to communicate to civilizations for the next 25000-50000 years what kind of waste that is. In Germany, the ongoing search for a permanent waste repository is going on for decades now. Funnily enough, this taxpayer's money is never calculated into the total cost of operating nuclear plant…

You'd put your waste in a breeder reactor until it has turned into short-lived isotopes that you only have to worry about for a few hundred years. Without breeder reactors we probably wouldn't have enough fuel anyway.

1. there are no working production-grade breeder reactors

2. you can't convert ALL of the waste into short-lived isotopes, just a fraction of it.

Sure, we can invest time and money into researching these topics, why not. But why not put the same energy into researching renewables?

Re: Nuclear energy is long-term sustainable

#39

1) there are no working thorium reactors 2) breeder reactors are hazardous 3) uranium seawater extraction doesn't exist 4) if uranium seawater extraction were made to work it would use enormous amounts of energy not reflected in this. The depressing truth is this shows that current uranium oxide reserves and nuclear tech could supply global energy needs for only 6 years.

> 1) there are no working thorium reactors This will likely soon change. > 2) breeder reactors are hazardous France seems to use them safely. > 3) uranium seawater extraction doesn't exist It will once we use breeder reactors. The reason seawater extraction doesn't exist is that it isn't economical. With breeder reactors, the calculus would change. > 4) if uranium seawater extraction were made to work it would use en…

> This will likely soon change.

It's almost like nuclear fusion, just with much smaller numbers. Thorium reactors are always just a few years away - since the late 1980s.

Re: Nuclear energy is long-term sustainable

#40
post #26
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plus, you know, storing the waste for thousands of years without a good place to do so. Payed for by the public.

We have good places to do so, it’s just they never are good enough to antinuclear activists.

When antinuclear activists constitute 90% of the population, the other people start to be called differently :( .

Despite attempts on HN to help me, I still don't see a good way to deal with nuclear waste, which would be well explained.

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