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Small nuclear reactors: tiny NuScale reactor gets safety approval

popularmechanics.com

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Re: Small nuclear reactors: tiny NuScale reactor gets safety approval

#241

Post by freeopinion »

RhodesianHunter wrote: post #58
marshray wrote: post #42

I think it's disingenuous to argue the economics of nuclear without mentioning: "DOE reported that it faced an estimated $494 billion in future environmental cleanup costs — a liability that roughly tripled during the previous 20 years." https://www.gao.gov/assets/700/696956.pdf

This is IMO a positive for nuclear, not a negative. You're forced to confront the cleanup as opposed to fossil fuels, where you just blow your waste out into the atmosphere and make it the commons' problem.

We don't have a good track record of confronting the cleanup of nuclear waste. The US federal government recently shipped a secret load of waste into Nevada. Nevada was very unhappy about that and claimed it was done in secrecy because it was illegal. After a bit of a fight, the feds caved and have agreed to remove the waste.

There is no plan for this stuff. The repository that was built in Nevada was never actually approved and it is not legal to use. So everyone that was planning on sending stuff there has just been piling it in the side yard waiting for something. New Mexico is now trying to open up a waste site.

But if you operate a reactor in Tennessee, right now you have no idea where to store the waste so you just keep piling it higher and deeper on site.

Source: rumour and gossip

Re: Small nuclear reactors: tiny NuScale reactor gets safety approval

#242

Post by gonational »

RhodesianHunter wrote: post #58
marshray wrote: post #42

I think it's disingenuous to argue the economics of nuclear without mentioning: "DOE reported that it faced an estimated $494 billion in future environmental cleanup costs — a liability that roughly tripled during the previous 20 years." https://www.gao.gov/assets/700/696956.pdf

This is IMO a positive for nuclear, not a negative. You're forced to confront the cleanup as opposed to fossil fuels, where you just blow your waste out into the atmosphere and make it the commons' problem.

Instead we will burn 700,000,000 quadrillion gigatons of rocket fuel to send all this poison to the sun.

Or just use wind and solar?

Re: Small nuclear reactors: tiny NuScale reactor gets safety approval

#243

Post by virtue3 »

Forbo wrote: post #168
karaterobot wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is in no way to disagree with your overall point, but marine cloud brightening looks like it might be a fairly cost-effective solution to climate change. It's unproven, but not an insane gamble either, and it has little risk of second-order consequences if it doesn't work. All that at a cost of single-digit billions per year. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marine_cloud_brightening#Costs

It seems to me to make more sense combating the problem at the source. This just seems to add more complexity to the problem. Did anyone else think of Snowpiercer when they saw this?

I think we can look to austrailia for many many many examples where we thought something would work out when we fucked with nature on a large scale without really studying it.

IE. Canetoads.

Re: Small nuclear reactors: tiny NuScale reactor gets safety approval

#244

Post by virtue3 »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #190
stickfigure wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nukes are slow from a cold start but they can throttle up and down with load. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load_following_power_plant#Nuc... Modern nuclear plants with light water reactors are designed to have maneuvering capabilities in the 30-100% range with 5%/minute slope.

What's the maneuvering ability of a coal plant? I looked at the article, but didn't see it.

Gas turbines are the ones that ramp the fastest and are used to handle dynamic peaky loads. Nuclear/coal are generally used as the baseline power because they're more efficient.

Re: Small nuclear reactors: tiny NuScale reactor gets safety approval

#245

Post by s1artibartfast »

jessaustin wrote: post #154
jabl wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this particular case, a power plant with these nuscale reactors would probably have survived a Fukushima type accident. One effect of being small is that the reactors are designed to be passively cooled after shutdown, using convection instead of pumped flow. So there is no need for emergency diesel generators to keep the coolant pumps running.

Sure, it's safer for reactors to tolerate flooding, if indeed these reactors actually do tolerate flooding. Definitely that would be a better design in flood/tsunami-prone areas. No design (from history, especially no reactor design) is perfect. A set of smaller reactors that were not co-located would be more tolerant of site-specific vulnerabilities in their design.

>A set of smaller reactors that were not co-located would be more tolerant of site-specific vulnerabilities in their design

That depends on what risks you are trying to mitigate. IF you are talking about site specific natural disasters and freak occurrences damaging a site. Then spreading them out increases risk of failure.

If you are worried about power loss after a site destroys a site, then colocation is worse. Of the two, damage to a site is the more pressing concern.

Re: Small nuclear reactors: tiny NuScale reactor gets safety approval

#246

Post by pdonis »

jhallenworld wrote: post #52

Here is the NRC website about this reactor: https://www.nrc.gov/reactors/new-reactors/smr/nuscale.html Here is an interesting sub-report: https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML2022/ML20224A525.pdf Information withheld for security reasons. One item concerns the "ultimate heat sink". What happens when the ultimate heat sink is lost? Well a design assumption is that it is not lost: https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML2020/ML20205L410.pdf…

> So drain the pool

As I understand it, the pool has no drain. There's nowhere the water can go. Which would make sense for a passive safety feature.

Re: Small nuclear reactors: tiny NuScale reactor gets safety approval

#247

Post by gxon »

asdfman123 wrote: post #210
omginternets wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only a method for permanent disposal of carbon dioxide emissions from gas plants actually existed.

Lots of methods exist, but they're too expensive or don't scale well.

Exactly. Scalable solutions to deal with the waste don't exist.

Re: Small nuclear reactors: tiny NuScale reactor gets safety approval

#248

Post by gonational »

linuxlizard wrote: post #221
Animats wrote: post #47

Four links down: "The staff has determined that the plant design meets the applicable requirements for the design certification stage of licensing. ... The NRC staff’s issuance of this FSER does not constitute a commitment to issue the design certification" [1] The actual review document is not up yet; search for "ML20023A318". It's not that this is smaller. It's comparable to Shippingport or Vallecitos. The argument…

> If something bad happens there, it's not a major problem. Well, unless you're in Idaho like some of us. ;-)

LMFAO at the fact that people actually downvoted you.

Pretty typical of the kind of people on here these days. Deranged, psychopath collectivists don’t give a shit about you or anyone but themselves.

Anyway, it’s not like the Emmett River Valley (in Idaho) has permanent problems with people getting cancer from nuclear explosions that took place 60 years ago a thousand miles south, or anything like that.

Re: Small nuclear reactors: tiny NuScale reactor gets safety approval

#249

Post by s1artibartfast »

Symmetry wrote: post #167
SamBam wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much energy would it take to extract one ton of uranium from the ocean?

Well, according to "Sustainable Energy Without the Hot Air" >Japanese researchers have found a technique for extracting uranium from seawater at a cost of $100–300 per kilogram of uranium, in comparison with a current cost of about $20/kg for uranium from ore. Because uranium contains so much more energy per ton than traditional fuels, this 5-fold or 15-fold increase in the cost of uranium would have little effect on…

Do you know if withouthotair is actively maintained? I used it in school more than a decade ago and I would love to reread a new version. I know the author died in 2016.

Re: Small nuclear reactors: tiny NuScale reactor gets safety approval

#250

Post by dylan604 »

omginternets wrote: post #172
IncRnd wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sigh... If only a method for converting carbon dioxide emissions into another gas actually existed in nature.

Plant trees and burn coal? That’s your plan?

Well, you need the trees to make more coal. Think of the children.
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