Nuclear fission fuel is inexhaustible (2022) • Hacker News Board

Re: Nuclear fission fuel is inexhaustible (2022)

#341

Post by ben_w » Mon, Jul 17, 2023, 2:34 PM UTC

ttfkam wrote: post #339

ben_w wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We have about a football field's worth of spent fuel sitting in casks and pools. That's not per reactor; that's in total in the US since we started running nuclear power stations Yes I know. Counterintuitively, this makes it politically worse, as people can imagine a football field much more easily than approximately the mass of Mt. Everest in CO2 every 5 years. People :P > Far more compact than batteries, Yes but…

>> A single tornado let alone a hurricane could wipe out gigawatts of solar or wind capacity. > That sounds like a problem with planning permission or construction if the plants can't cope with wherever they happen to be installed. It appears you do not live somewhere with extreme weather. How do you plan to protect hundreds or thousands of square meters during events? Is there some kind of new glass? Panels made of…

> Is there some kind of new glass?

Yes, every other year thanks to the phone market.

We also have transparent aluminium (oxynitride) now.

Not there this should be a particularly hard challenge relative to "people live in these places, do their roofs and windows survive?" (even if you have to use shutters, NDB, do that for the PV also).

There's also the option to have transmission lines and can put the panels elsewhere in the places without whatever… and they already exist and are in place: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Wide_area_synchronou...

Re: Nuclear fission fuel is inexhaustible (2022)

#342

Post by pyrale » Mon, Jul 17, 2023, 3:30 PM UTC

Kon5ole wrote: post #338

pyrale wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But that isn't the case here. When the debt causes you to be bailed out by the government, is is an issue, wouldn't you agree? EDF's current situation is an issue. My point, however, is that this is not related to electricity pricing, nuclear or not. > Since the organisation is nationalised, that money will come from the taxpayers. Yes, so what? France's general budget received tens of billions in dividends from ED…

>France's general budget received tens of billions in dividends from EDF in recent years, would you say EDF saved as much for the taxpayer? Of course, my point is only that it's true to say that EDF sold the power too cheaply, otherwise they would have been profitable and debt-free. The question that has to be answered is whether nuclear can provide power at a competitive price once all the costs are counted. Current…

> Of course, my point is only that it's true to say that EDF sold the power too cheaply, otherwise they would have been profitable and debt-free.

They have been profitable for decades.

As for the debt, part of the debt is logical for such a group to have (i.e. amortizing the expense that was or is being made to extend the plants' lifetime).

Part of it is due to being required by the government to make bad decisions (e.g. buying and recapitalizing Areva, giving 8 billions worth of electricity to their competitors this winter, ...). This debt is unrelated to EDF's operations.

> Yankee costs 10 million USD per year still to this day with no end in sight.

That is related to long term storage, not dismantling. There's no reason for that to cost billions in France, where a storage site is on the rails.

> Why doesn't that count as being part of the decommissioning costs?

Decomissioning a plant has two parts: dismantling, which is a one-time cost, and long-term storage, which is an ongoing cost. The specific issue with the US govt. is that, when the plants were being built, it guaranted that a storage solution would be built, but didn't deliver. That's why the government currently pays for storage. There is no technical reason for this to happen.

> This means that every year, at least 10 million USD has to retroactively be added to the actual cost of electricity generated by that plant. [...] To say that nobody knows what it actually costs is quite fair IMO

By that same logic, it's impossible to know the cost of anything. Maybe future politicians will force people to recycle their solar panels at outrageous cost?

The only logical decision is to separate the cost of decomissioning (dismantling, a reasonable duration of dry-cask storage and the cost of a long-term storage site) and the cost of political decisions.

Re: Nuclear fission fuel is inexhaustible (2022)

#343

Post by ryathal » Mon, Jul 17, 2023, 4:18 PM UTC

credit_guy wrote: post #310

acidburnNSA wrote: post #106

Nuclear engineer here. I did a similar write-up (gratuitously leveraging GNU Units) since most people don't seem to know this fact about fission breeder reactors. I added some other references at the bottom of people pointing this out throughout nuclear fission's history. https://whatisnuclear.com/nuclear-sustainability.html In addition to the OP, it's also worth mentioning that you can breed with slow (aka 'thermal'…

Since you are an industry insider, do you have an estimate when we’ll have commercial fast neutron reactors in the US?

5-10 years after the US is serious about wanting them.

Re: Nuclear fission fuel is inexhaustible (2022)

#344

Post by Borg3 » Mon, Jul 17, 2023, 4:35 PM UTC

mcpackieh wrote: post #133

sidewndr46 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't that a safety thing? To shutdown a natural gas plant you just close some valves feeding the facility, or at worse introduce something into the combustion path that halts combustion. Nuclear fission obviously can be moderated, but not in such a sharp and safe manner.

I think you're confusing a few concepts here. Thermal-spectrum (slow neutron) nuclear reactors are much easier to control than fast reactors because they have much slower reaction times. But this isn't particularly relevant because thermal-spectrum supercritical water reactors are possible; supercritical water reactor doesn't implies fast reactor. Let's put fast reactors aside. In thermal-spectrum reactors, the moder…

Ahh right... The neutron corrosion. Same problem with fussion reactors. The problem is, there is no material that can survive this imo. The only one we know that can, exists in neutron stars and its ultra dense. Its unusable by us (different structural scale).

We are DOOOMED! ;)

Re: Nuclear fission fuel is inexhaustible (2022)

#345

Post by jvanderbot » Mon, Jul 17, 2023, 4:48 PM UTC

pfdietz wrote: post #340

jvanderbot wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right in principle, but I disagree on the particulars. Not to attempt to convince you, just to explain my rationale: we have proven it works. It is carbon zero (ish). It slots into the grid. The fuel source is not a problem. The byproducts are containable. It can serve as baseload for distributed solar and I guess wind (though wind is a capital disaster for other reasons). And nuclear waste is ugly for 500 yea…

I can stipulate all your claims there and still argue that it doesn't make sense to build more nuclear power plants. You have not made the case for that.

> Not to attempt to convince you, just to explain my rationale

Re: Nuclear fission fuel is inexhaustible (2022)

#346

Post by Kon5ole » Mon, Jul 17, 2023, 5:07 PM UTC

pyrale wrote: post #342

Kon5ole wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>France's general budget received tens of billions in dividends from EDF in recent years, would you say EDF saved as much for the taxpayer? Of course, my point is only that it's true to say that EDF sold the power too cheaply, otherwise they would have been profitable and debt-free. The question that has to be answered is whether nuclear can provide power at a competitive price once all the costs are counted. Current…

> Of course, my point is only that it's true to say that EDF sold the power too cheaply, otherwise they would have been profitable and debt-free. They have been profitable for decades. As for the debt, part of the debt is logical for such a group to have (i.e. amortizing the expense that was or is being made to extend the plants' lifetime). Part of it is due to being required by the government to make bad decisions (…

>They have been profitable for decades.

How can you know if they were profitable or not before you know the final costs?

>> Why doesn't that count as being part of the decommissioning costs? >Decomissioning a plant has two parts: dismantling, which is a one-time cost, and long-term storage,

Certainly, but the yankee plant is currently housing the fuel in a short-term storage container on-site. So the dismantling part is not completed yet, and the costs are ongoing. It's not yet in the "long-term-storage" phase of operations, which btw also cost money.

>Maybe future politicians will force people to recycle their solar panels at outrageous cost?

The difference with nuclear compared to other sources is that the costs of nuclear __have__ to be handled. If an operator of a solar panel plant goes bankrupt, the state doesn't have to pay a cent since the plant simply stops costing money when it is shut down. That makes it much easier to estimate the costs.

If an operator of a nuclear plant goes bankrupt however, the state simply has to cover all the costs to ensure proper handling of the fuel and waste.

We have to date not managed to do so reliably anywhere in the world, so how can we claim to know the costs?

Re: Nuclear fission fuel is inexhaustible (2022)

#347

Post by pyrale » Mon, Jul 17, 2023, 5:49 PM UTC

Kon5ole wrote: post #346

pyrale wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Of course, my point is only that it's true to say that EDF sold the power too cheaply, otherwise they would have been profitable and debt-free. They have been profitable for decades. As for the debt, part of the debt is logical for such a group to have (i.e. amortizing the expense that was or is being made to extend the plants' lifetime). Part of it is due to being required by the government to make bad decisions (…

>They have been profitable for decades. How can you know if they were profitable or not before you know the final costs? >> Why doesn't that count as being part of the decommissioning costs? >Decomissioning a plant has two parts: dismantling, which is a one-time cost, and long-term storage, Certainly, but the yankee plant is currently housing the fuel in a short-term storage container on-site. So the dismantling part…

> but the yankee plant is currently housing the fuel in a short-term storage container on-site.

It's hardly short term if it's been there for 26 years.

> It's not yet in the "long-term-storage" phase of operations

And, judging by the ongoing process, it's not close to be. For no technical reason, it's just politicians doing politician things.

So, the logical conclusion is that no one can predict what politicians could do. If they do this, what makes you think that they wouldn't pass a law forcing people to recycle current solar panels at an outrageous cost? You've been claiming that it's impossible to know anything about anything related to nuclear, but the same claims also hold for any other production source, since this kind of political decision is, essentially, arbitrary.

Welcome to the FUD, if you can do it, others can do it too.

Re: Nuclear fission fuel is inexhaustible (2022)

#348

Post by yawaramin » Mon, Jul 17, 2023, 6:12 PM UTC

pfdietz wrote: post #336

yawaramin wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with those power sources–and this has been pointed out many, many times–is they don't make reliable base load power. The sun doesn't shine at night–no solar power. Winds don't blow on calm days–no wind power. You are forced to build massive battery farms. Batteries require mining chemicals. For the scale we are talking about, you would be strip-mining the earth. You are forced to make incredibly costly up…

The intermittency of renewables adds costs, but these costs are finite and declining. At this point it's likely that going with renewables will be cheaper than going with nuclear, especially as one projects these declines into the next couple of decades (when any nuclear plant started now will have to compete with improved renewable and storage technologies.) A quote: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9837910 "On…

Theoretical price decreases are not, in fact, convincing fossil fuel companies to get into renewables when they are making record-breaking profits from FF: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jul/16/big-oil-clim...

The plan by RE people is 'Let's hope that a hundred different unlikely events all line up exactly right, and we'll be able to go fully RE'. This is not a realistic plan. If you did software engineering like this, you would be laughed out of the room (and then fired).

Re: Nuclear fission fuel is inexhaustible (2022)

#349

Post by olddustytrail » Mon, Jul 17, 2023, 6:30 PM UTC

melling wrote: post #16

jillesvangurp wrote: post #12

The article has a great flow chart in it that highlights rejected energy and energy services and where the rejected energy comes from. energy here spans the spectrum of electricity generation, heating, industrial usage, transport, etc. Basically more than two thirds of the energy is lost to heat, friction, noise, transmission losses, etc. Most of the losses are coal, gas, and oil. Important to note that the image is…

“Coal declined a lot” Yes, in the United States (4% of global population), coal usage declined. Unfortunately, globally coal usage is at all time highs. https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/global-coal-cons... I’d say it’s ok that we overlooked that but we were warned 45 years ago about global coal usage being a large part of the problem. https://youtu.be/Wp-WiNXH6hI

4% of global population but 28% of global CO2 emissions. You forgot to mention that.

Re: Nuclear fission fuel is inexhaustible (2022)

#350

Post by pfdietz » Mon, Jul 17, 2023, 6:50 PM UTC

jvanderbot wrote: post #345

pfdietz wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can stipulate all your claims there and still argue that it doesn't make sense to build more nuclear power plants. You have not made the case for that.

> Not to attempt to convince you, just to explain my rationale

Just pointing out that your rationale is not something that should have convinced even you. So ask yourself: if you cannot construct an argument that can convince someone else of your position, did you really arrive at that position by rational means?