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Naval Reactors Should Be Empowered to Show the Way Again
HydroDave63:
--- Quote from: Broadzilla on Dec 05, 2013, 06:44 ---If Naval Reactors shows the way every commercial plant in the country will go Fukushima. WHAT an idiot.
--- End quote ---
Just the BWRs :P
Fermi2:
--- Quote from: Marlin on Dec 05, 2013, 10:49 --- I have to disagree with both of you. The industry is locked into light water reactors to redirect the technology may take an entity that is not locked into that mindset. Thorium, small modular reactors and breeders are not on the front burner for the commercial industry and the DOE is not independent enough to steer to new nuclear options with its mandates to find new green alternative power sources. I won't argue the fine points but the general concept of giving the Navy (military/NASA) the mission to innovate and turn over technology (of mutual benefit) to the private sector is sound and has been in practice for a very long time (i.e. GPS, materials sciences, internet). Last I heard the Navy is funding Robert Bussard's Polywell fusion reactor.
--- End quote ---
Small MOdular Reactor. Non Economical. Thorium. No viable design exists.
Fact: The only reason Rickover built the first Commercial reactor was he would not give up control of the Uranium. Other better designs existed. As with many things Rickover it was a retrograde step.
GLW:
As long as corporations have the liability of spent fuel, radwaste, etc. and their associated half lives there is no business model which supports nuclear generation,...
Without reprocessing or repositories it's just stupid or bullheaded,....financially,...
At the end of the day if you cannot find a garbageman or cannot find the regulatory framework to be your own garbageman then any multi-generational commitment to commercial nuclear electricity investment is fraught with financial unknowns,...
[coffee]
(sic)
Marlin:
--- Quote from: Broadzilla on Dec 06, 2013, 12:43 ---
Small MOdular Reactor. Non Economical. Thorium. No viable design exists.
Fact: The only reason Rickover built the first Commercial reactor was he would not give up control of the Uranium. Other better designs existed. As with many things Rickover it was a retrograde step.
--- End quote ---
Rickover was at the top of Maslow's hierarchy he did things for ego he wanted to be the father of nuclear power not just the father of Navy nuclear, he stood in front of congress many times testifying on the safety of commercial and Navy reactors. As for economy you may be right for traditional thinking but that is what the authors point is, remove the entanglements of the current commercial industry and hand development to an outside entity. SMRs would put nuclear in the realm of an individual facility such as Paducah for Silex or Oak Ridge for ORNL and Y-12 as the paper below outlines. As for thorium that is the point of the recommendation as well, to design and put a new technology on the table.
http://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/Economic%20Aspects%20of%20SMRs.pdf
hamsamich:
Anybody with enough power to do what needs to get done would be an improvement. GLW is right. The reason this business in failing in my opinion is self imposed by all levels of politics in this country. Sure it is being exacerbated by natural gas prices and single unit-low MW inefficiencies but not being allowed to take your billion dollar garbage to the dump then catching the blame for that by media hogging ultra environmentalist panty wastes makes it an impossible game to win.
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