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Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040

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Re: Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040

#481

Post by mixdup »

padjo wrote: post #422
mixdup wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the problem was that they diverged from the standard design in key important ways. The trick would be not to do that, to actually stick to the standard design. Or, to make sure that the impacts of deviations are fully accounted for and incorporated back into the overall design and project Again, the standardization didn't cause the problem. Boeing's piss poor engineering culture did. There's no reason that they co…

The point is that standardisation can act as an impediment to innovation. People then use creative engineering to remain technically compliant. This ultimately leads to hidden or hard to detect risks because everything is "to standard", except it's not.

And on the other hand people can just design dangerous and dumb products even without the constraint of standardization.

Re: Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040

#482

Post by Moldoteck »

Jedd wrote: post #476
Moldoteck wrote: post #465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also relevant - all recent Canadian refurbs were on time and budget

When you say 'all' - is that five? Since 1999?

I mean these https://www.opg.com/news-resources/newsroom/our-stories/stor...

https://news.ontario.ca/en/release/1007558/ontario-delivers-...

Re: Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040

#483

Post by Moldoteck »

loloquwowndueo wrote: post #477
Moldoteck wrote: post #461

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you can create even more jobs with ren. But not all jobs are the same. With ren you compete with China. With nuclear - you are somewhat protected since many don't like the idea of a hualong near them

What’s ren? What’s hualong?

Ren= renewables. Hualong is the domestic Chinese reactor design

Re: Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040

#484

Post by Moldoteck »

troupo wrote: post #473
Moldoteck wrote: post #456

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chernobyl was triggered by humans but the ultimate problem was it's design. And it shows - Fukushima was triggered by tsunami, but ultimate problem was again the design. But since the design was much better, the impact is much milder vs Chernobyl

> Fukushima was triggered by tsunami, but ultimate problem was again the design. And honestly it wasn't, not really. It was hit with a record-breaking earthquake and a record-breaking tsunami... and more lives were lost due to evacuation than to the plant shutdown.

The design was bad in the sense they backported generator placement from US BWR projects in basement. It makes sense in US but risks in Japan are different

Yes, radiation killed zero. Evacuation - thousands

Re: Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040

#485

Post by pfdietz »

troupo wrote: post #401
pfdietz wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, nuclear is terrible for covering seasonality, since unless it's used with high capacity factor the cost per kWh skyrockets.

> No, nuclear is terrible for covering seasonality, wat How is nuclear bad at covering the seasonality of, for example, winter in the Nordics?

It's best for covering a constant demand, not a seasonal component of demand.

If renewables grow to the point where there is no remaining near-constant unmet demand, nuclear has no place at all.

Re: Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040

#486

Post by DennisP »

markvdb wrote: post #480
DennisP wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of the GenIV designs would be compact and easily mass-produced. You'll never get waste management below about 300 years with fission, because that's basically what you get from the fission products. But the really long-term stuff is plutonium and other transuranics. Those are unburnt fuel. Fast reactors and some molten salt reactors are supposed to eliminate that. Bury the fission products for 300 years and they…

> You'll never get waste management below about 300 years with fission, because that's basically what you get from the fission products. That's at least one and probably more like five wars over the reactor territory. I'm mildly optimistic about fusion's potential...

Bear in mind the decay is exponential, so most of the radioactivity is in the near term. There's no fissile, and by mass it's about 1% as much as we're getting now from conventional reactor spent fuel. Encase it in glass and bury it, and you're probably good.

I'm mildly optimistic about fusion as well. One big advantage is regulatory; fission reactors can be safe if you design them well, but fusion reactors can't do much damage even if they're terrible. The NRC has already decided on a much lighter regulatory regime for them.

Re: Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040

#487

Post by Moldoteck »

fc417fc802 wrote: post #160
delecti wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Leaving aside that Canada is huge, waste is really just not that much of a problem. It would be easy to safely store all the waste that will ever be produced at a dedicated storage site, if you could drum up the political will for such a site to exist. But really, it's even easier to just store it all on-site. Not that much waste is produced; stick it in a cask and leave it alone.

> But really, it's even easier to just store it all on-site. I agree with the rest but on site storage of high level waste is a terrible idea. Even after vitrification that's material that will remain dangerously radioactive for longer than agrarian human civilization has existed. Ideally it should enter a disposal chain that keeps as little of it at ground level for a short a time as possible in order to hedge again…

Most dangerous phase of the waste is first ±300y. Afterwards most radiation is low energy and most of the danger would come from ingestion like with any toxic chemical

Re: Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040

#488

Post by Moldoteck »

rgmerk wrote: post #440
stinkbeetle wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A biogas turbine for the last few percent of demand?? Peak electricity demand occurs when solar generation has dropped to nearly zero. It's not the last few percent, it's the last 90 something percent demand. This is the entire problem with solar (and wind, though slightly different patterns). If you're going to "they should just" it, you really need to know at least that. It's just a hard problem even in Australia.…

The evening peak is well on its way to being a solved problem in Australia. https://reneweconomy.com.au/big-batteries-took-a-bite-out-of... And average prices in the Australian national electricity market are going down as a result: https://www.aemo.com.au/newsroom/media-release/renewables-li...

Looking at past few days, I wouldnt say it's on it's way to be solved https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/AU-SA/live/hourly

SA has highest household prices in Australia (or close to the top at least)

Re: Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040

#489

Post by Moldoteck »

credit_guy wrote: post #138
preisschild wrote: post #20

CANDUs are cool, hope to see more in the world

I love nuclear reactors and CANDU are quite cool. But I don't think that today we have any reasons to build CANDU reactors, except possibly that Canada can demonstrate they can build them for cheaper than others can build light water reactors. The ability to build is something that has little to do with the technical merits of a nuclear reactor design. But all things being equal, a PWR or a BWR should cost less per G…

Proliferation is irrelevant. It was not a Candu reactor what India have used and without Russia's help it's unlikely it would have happened. But there are easier and cheaper pathways - uranium enrichment distributed to be stealthy

Related to US, it'll happen sooner or later https://www.nucnet.org/news/atkinsrealis-to-begin-licensing-...

Re: Canada plans 'nuclear renaissance' with up to 10 reactors built by 2040

#490

Post by credit_guy »

Moldoteck wrote: post #489
credit_guy wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love nuclear reactors and CANDU are quite cool. But I don't think that today we have any reasons to build CANDU reactors, except possibly that Canada can demonstrate they can build them for cheaper than others can build light water reactors. The ability to build is something that has little to do with the technical merits of a nuclear reactor design. But all things being equal, a PWR or a BWR should cost less per G…

Proliferation is irrelevant. It was not a Candu reactor what India have used and without Russia's help it's unlikely it would have happened. But there are easier and cheaper pathways - uranium enrichment distributed to be stealthy Related to US, it'll happen sooner or later https://www.nucnet.org/news/atkinsrealis-to-begin-licensing-...

> Proliferation is irrelevant

I would not be so cavalier about that.

> It was not a Candu reactor what India have used

It was a heavy water reactor, called CIRUS [1], based on the NRX reactor that later evolved into the CANDU reactor [2].

> But there are easier and cheaper pathways - uranium enrichment distributed to be stealthy

Iran tried that. It is not easy to keep centrifuges stealthy, you need tens of thousands of them, and they need to be organized in cascades, you can't have one here, one there. You need a few hundred here, a few hundred there, and you need conversion and deconversion facilities (of uranium oxide into/from uranium hexafluride). It is virtually impossible to keep such a program secret, the more distributed it is, the more people need to be involved, how do you keep a program secret if there are thousands of people working in those numerous facilities?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIRUS_reactor

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CANDU_reactor#Early_efforts

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