The Energy In Nuclear Waste Could Power the US For 100 Years, But the Technology Was Never Commercialized (cnbc.com) 170
There is enough energy in the nuclear waste in the United States to power the entire country for 100 years with clean energy, says Jess C. Gehin at the Idaho National Laboratory. CNBC reports: There are 93 commercial nuclear reactors at 55 operating sites in the United States, according to Scott Burnell, spokesperson for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Twenty-six are in some stage of decommissioning process. All of the nuclear reactors that operate in the U.S. are light-water reactor designs [...]. In a light-water reactor, uranium-235 fuel powers a fission reaction, where the nucleus of an atom splits into smaller nuclei and releases energy. The energy heats water, creating steam which is used to power a generator and produce electricity. The nuclear fission reaction leaves waste, which is radioactive and has to be maintained carefully. There are about 80,000 metric tons of used fuel from light-water nuclear reactors in the United States and the existing nuclear fleet produces approximately an additional 2,000 tons of used fuel each year, Gehin told CNBC. But after a light-water reactor has run its reactor powered by uranium-235, there is still tremendous amount of energy potential still available in what is left.
"Fundamentally, in light-water reactors, out of the uranium we dig out of the ground, we use a half a percent of the energy that's in the uranium that's dug out of the ground," Gehin told CNBC in a phone interview. "You can get a large fraction of that energy if you were to recycle the fuel through fast reactors." Fast reactors don't slow down the neutrons that are released in the fission reaction, and faster neutrons beget more efficient fission reactions, Gehin told CNBC. "Fast neutron reactors can more effectively convert uranium-238, which is predominantly what's in spent fuel, to plutonium, so you can fission it," Gehin said.
Even as private companies are working to innovate and commercialize fast reactor designs, there are significant infrastructure hurdles. Before nuclear waste can be used to power fast reactors, it has to go through reprocessing. Right now, only Russia has the capacity to do this at scale. France, too, has the capacity to recycle used nuclear waste, Gehin said, but the country generally takes its recycled fuel and puts it back into existing light water reactors. For now, the Idaho National Lab can reprocess enough fuel for research and development, Gehin told CNBC, but not much more.
Private companies commercializing fast reactor technology are pushing for domestic fuel supply chains to be developed. TerraPower says it's investing in supply chains and working with elected leaders to build political support, while Oklo has received three government awards and is working with the government to commercialize fast reactor fuel supply chains domestically. The other option to power fast reactors is to create HALEU fuel, which stands for high-assay low-enriched uranium, from scratch, rather than by recycling nuclear waste. (Where conventional reactors use uranium enriched up to 5%, HALEU is uranium enriched up to 20%.) It's arguably easier to produce HALEU directly than by recycling spent waste, says Gehin, but ultimately, the cheaper option will win out. "It will be largely be driven by what makes sense economically." Regardless, Russia is the only country that has the capacity to make HALEU at commercial scale.
"Fundamentally, in light-water reactors, out of the uranium we dig out of the ground, we use a half a percent of the energy that's in the uranium that's dug out of the ground," Gehin told CNBC in a phone interview. "You can get a large fraction of that energy if you were to recycle the fuel through fast reactors." Fast reactors don't slow down the neutrons that are released in the fission reaction, and faster neutrons beget more efficient fission reactions, Gehin told CNBC. "Fast neutron reactors can more effectively convert uranium-238, which is predominantly what's in spent fuel, to plutonium, so you can fission it," Gehin said.
Even as private companies are working to innovate and commercialize fast reactor designs, there are significant infrastructure hurdles. Before nuclear waste can be used to power fast reactors, it has to go through reprocessing. Right now, only Russia has the capacity to do this at scale. France, too, has the capacity to recycle used nuclear waste, Gehin said, but the country generally takes its recycled fuel and puts it back into existing light water reactors. For now, the Idaho National Lab can reprocess enough fuel for research and development, Gehin told CNBC, but not much more.
Private companies commercializing fast reactor technology are pushing for domestic fuel supply chains to be developed. TerraPower says it's investing in supply chains and working with elected leaders to build political support, while Oklo has received three government awards and is working with the government to commercialize fast reactor fuel supply chains domestically. The other option to power fast reactors is to create HALEU fuel, which stands for high-assay low-enriched uranium, from scratch, rather than by recycling nuclear waste. (Where conventional reactors use uranium enriched up to 5%, HALEU is uranium enriched up to 20%.) It's arguably easier to produce HALEU directly than by recycling spent waste, says Gehin, but ultimately, the cheaper option will win out. "It will be largely be driven by what makes sense economically." Regardless, Russia is the only country that has the capacity to make HALEU at commercial scale.
All for research and subsidies for Nuclear (Score:4, Informative)
A nation this big can afford to subsidize continued research and development to the tune of up to 25 billion per year. Actually build and test reactors to continue learning.
But-- I don't think nuclear is needed for more than base line power and it has as ton of issues around waste, decommissioning, and lack of insurance (so any cost overruns pass straight to consumers).
I also feel that nuclear is immoral or unethical because the model is "we get cheaper power and executives get big salary but the any excess costs are going to be paid by people not even born yet, most of whom will not get any cheaper power."
I think larger escrows are in order. And I was appalled that in that one state they just flat out put an extra charge on consumers when the plant wasn't as profitable as promised.
Re: All for research and subsidies for Nuclear (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: All for research and subsidies for Nuclear (Score:4, Interesting)
Wow- hard to believe they nuked you to -1 over :
"But Nuclear is an environmentalist dream - no CO2 gasses. Electricity isn't going away and will keep going up especially with electric cars. Wind and solar just cannot produce the massive needed energy. And even if nuclear is more expensive at the moment you can't shut it down because then natural gas demand will skyrocket and make a bigger issue"
Actually- nuclear has some issues with climate warming.
It needs lots of water for cooling unless it's being run at less than full power. This has already happened in france (and I think germany) where there wasn't' enough water that was cool enough to run the plant so they ran it at lower production. (and that includes the Nutran? micro nuclear).
Wind and Solar *absolutely* can produce the massive needed energy-- The energy from solar is practically limitless but both need storage. I think the best model would be a day's power storage for every citizen. They would draw the storage down but then it would be refilled. And in times of disaster, they could reduce consumption enough to extend that power to 2 or 3 days. Some could be at individual houses but others could be the iron neighborhood battery storage. And it's not all batteries- gravity storage with heavy dense liquids looks promising.
There is a place for nuclear and we should absolutely keep working to make it
* less expensive
* less toxic
* more predictable to decomission.
I'm very leery of nuclear where profit is involved or where government power is involved. We've already seen lots of disasters in many fields due to human factors due to the fact humans underestimate risks sooner or later. And you just can't do that with Nuclear. It's very tricky to identify real risks without overreacting and spending a ton of money to exist alleged risks that are unlikely (but how do you judge "unlikely?" Like the Space Shuttle?"
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https://www.reuters.com/articl... [reuters.com]
"Hot weather cuts French, German nuclear power output
PARIS/FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Scorching temperatures across Europe coupled with prolonged dry weather has reduced French nuclear power generation by around 5.2 gigawatts (GW) or 8%, French power grid operator RTEâ(TM)s data showed on Thursday.
Electricity output was curtailed at six reactors by 0840 GMT on Thursday, while two other reactors were offline, data showed. High water temperatures and sluggish flows limit the a
Re: All for research and subsidies for Nuclear (Score:2)
I can't remember if they were ever taken offline but US plants certainly wind down every summer. This is because the water temp is already elevated and they would dump enough heat to raise it above the danger levels of aquatic life and the dependent ecosystem. So they pull back and reduce power generation. Although they do also get exemptions from those dumping limits as it's summer and killing a few fish is better than people's air conditioning not working.
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https://www.reuters.com/articl... [reuters.com]
"Hot weather cuts French, German nuclear power output
PARIS/FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Scorching temperatures across Europe coupled with prolonged dry weather has reduced French nuclear power generation by around 5.2 gigawatts (GW) or 8%, French power grid operator RTEâ(TM)s data showed on Thursday.
Electricity output was curtailed at six reactors by 0840 GMT on Thursday, while two other reactors were offline, data showed. High water temperatures and sluggish flows limit the ability to use river water to cool reactors.
In Germany, PreussenElektra, the nuclear unit of utility E.ON, said it would take its Grohnde reactor offline on Friday due to high temperatures in the Weser river."
River temperature derates are common in all thermal generating plants (not just nuclear), sometimes there are even derates for lake temperatures though that's more rare. Usually it's done so as not to exceed a certain discharge temperature back into the body of water, as that can disturb fish. It's an environmental precaution, and is waived as external factors warrant. Really no different than the frequent derates a lot of hydroelectric dams experience to maintain lake levels and water quality. It's not
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
It needs lots of water for cooling unless it's being run at less than full power.
Using molten salt coolant, molten salt thermal storage, and air breathing Brayton cycle turbines and there's no water needed for coolant. It also allows a nuclear power plant to load follow, removing the need for natural gas backup power.
There's closed cycle water cooling that lowers the need for water significantly. Some still boils away so something has to make up for that. Even in a desert some power used to extract the water back from the air or ground. Using air cooling for part of the cooling and
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Using molten salt coolant, molten salt thermal storage
These are not commercialised technologies. We need to go with what there is and build at scale for nuclear to be relevant. Calling for molten salt coolant is asking for further delays. Do you want further delays?
Re: All for research and subsidies for Nuclear (Score:4, Informative)
Using molten salt coolant, molten salt thermal storage, and air breathing Brayton cycle turbines and there's no water needed for coolant.
If you can do *all those things*, then there's no need for a nuclear reactor either. You can just keep your molten salt molten using the inevitable excesses in renewable generation which will have very low marginal costs. Those *will* exist whether you want them or not. At that point ignoring the virtually free energy that nobody else has other use for and building a reactor instead becomes an economically unsound decision.
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Okay.. first-- I don't think your post is a troll. What the hell is wrong with Slashdot moderators these days?
The reason I said you "just can't do that with nuclear" is that the consequences of a nuclear plant failure can be huge. If a wind tower fails or falls over, the risk is much smaller.
And yes- I agree completely we need to continue doing R&D and actually building nuclear plants. To the tune of about $25 billion a year for the U.S. alone. But I think (after decades), it's *still* too early t
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Wow- hard to believe they nuked you to -1 over : "But Nuclear is an environmentalist dream - no CO2 gasses. Electricity isn't going away and will keep going up especially with electric cars. Wind and solar just cannot produce the massive needed energy. And even if nuclear is more expensive at the moment you can't shut it down because then natural gas demand will skyrocket and make a bigger issue"
Sigh...no one down modded hunter44102's post. In fact, it's only be up modded. hunter44102's karma is just such that their posts start at -1.
Re: All for research and subsidies for Nuclear (Score:5, Interesting)
Just thinking of the concrete for the two technologies.
For wind,
https://www.windpowerengineeri... [windpowerengineering.com]
"Cement supplied by Lafarge North America played a key role in the construction earlier this year of the Blue Creek Wind Farm in Ohio, which is owned and operated by Iberdrola Renewables. One of the largest wind power plants in the world with 152 Gamesa G90 turbines, the facility has a generating capacity of 304 MW.
Lafarge provided Type I portland cement from its Paulding plant to Irving Concrete of Ohio, which built a portable ready-mix batch plant to produce about 122,500 yd3 of concrete for the project. The construction of 15 to 20-foot-deep concrete foundations to support all of the 328-foot-high towers with 2-MW turbines required 30,000 tons of cement. On average, each of these below-ground support systems used 60 truckloads of concrete (750 yd3), which was poured in two steps. A 2-ft. thick mud matte was poured first to create a solid base and then an upper pedestal where the tower connects was poured in step two. The huge bolts that fasten to the tower were embedded into the upper section of the concrete. Quality testing was conducted at 7, 14, 21 and 28 days to ensure a solid cure."
For Vogtle,
https://www.prnewswire.com/new... [prnewswire.com]
"Since the beginning of the project, more than 680,000 cubic yards of concrete have been placed for the new units, enough to build a sidewalk from Miami to Seattle."
So for wind the have 304 MW peak with a 33% capacity factor, while the two nuclear plants have 1150 MW each, with an 85% capacity factor.
So you need 19 of those wind farms to match Vogtle. And that many wind farms would take 3 times more concrete than the nuclear plant. Oof.
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So for wind the have 304 MW peak with a 33% capacity factor
YOU do not know the capacity factor of that wind plant. As YOU did not measure it. So claiming 33% is a fetch out of thin air.
while the two nuclear plants have 1150 MW each, with an 85% capacity factor.
YOU do not know the capacity factor of those nuclear plants. As YOU did not measure it. So claiming 85% is a fetch out of thin air.
So you need 19 of those wind farms to match Vogtle. And that many wind farms would take 3 times more concrete than the nuclear plant. Oof.
And only an idiot would care about that.
I shouldn't feed the troll, but...
Thirty and change percent capacity factors for a wind farm would be pretty typical. I have access to data for a wind farm of similar size, and seasonally it'll oscillate in that 20-50% range. Obviously in real time it could be as high as 100% or as low as maybe 5%, but on average 33% is probably pretty close. If you want to be optimistic on taller turbines and better siting, we'll round it up to 40% if it makes you feel better.
Unfortunately that nuclear plant number prob
Naval gazing for CO2 (Score:2)
You're right, it is navel gazing in a lot of cases. As a note, if you're getting this in depth, even solar and wind produce CO2, especially wind - because you need concrete for their footings.
So the Environmentalists are taking worst case assumptions, and the proponents are probably taking best case.
For example, I just googled "natural gas grams co2 per kwh" and got this [carbonindependent.org]. Which says that NG isn't 90 to 140g per kWh, but according to it, it is 185 g/kWh. Indeed, they add in more inefficiencies (like NG le
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Okay, but if you are going to link https://www.carbonbrief.org/so... [carbonbrief.org] showing nuclear is 4g/kWH, then shouldn't you have also mentioned that the page also shows Wind and Solar have lower carbon footprints than nuclear on that site?
The numbers given by that site are so different I'm a bit dubious. But I'm also a bit dubious of the other calculations as well. Both sides are playing games with the numbers.
My main issue with nuclear is the almost unlimited downside risk. The downside risk from Wind and Sola
Was concentrating on Nuke and NG (Score:2)
I think you might have mistaken the 1st chart, which is "embodied energy use", which I think is the energy needed to set up and run the generation system, much like how it takes power to run the spark plugs in a gasoline engine, for CO2 generation.
If you look in the article:
The study finds each kilowatt hour of electricity generated over the lifetime of a nuclear plant has an emissions footprint of 4 grammes of CO2 equivalent (gCO2e/kWh). The footprint of solar comes in at 6gCO2e/kWh and wind is also 4gCO2e/kWh.
You'll find that they say that solar actually produces more CO2, and wind is equal to nuclear. But they're all insignificant by the standards of NG and other hydrocarbon energy sources.
Finally, I'll darn well admit that I was laser focu
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Well, it depends on whether or not you consider the "green" party in Germany(for example) to be environmentalists or not(despite whatever they may claim).
Even after Russia invaded Ukraine, they're pushing to keep buying NG from Russia over keeping the nuclear plants running. Of course, it turns out that they may have been funded by Gazprom(Russia's NG company)...
So it might be better to call them "antinuclear advocates claiming to be environmentalists" rather than "environmentalists".
But I've seen a lot of
AB&C (Score:2)
Well, you're the one that said that environmentalists would oppose NG even as they oppose nuclear. I was saying that it was more complicated.
For example, what if we added another factor, economy? It takes time and money to go solar/wind, especially with the buffering you need for high levels of that, so natural gas can provide an economical way to cover for that until technology develops further an sufficient investment(without killing the economy) can happen.
What escapes me to grasp however is: what has Russian gas to do with German nuclear plants (BTW: there is only one left)
Didn't I say it already? Gazprom, the Russian
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> Environmentalists calculate that It produces about half the CO2 levels as natural gas plants
And that straight forwards is a dirty lie by the moscow payed Anti-Nuclear-Church. Ask for evidence and they usually quote some pretty weird sites doing totally fake calculations.
The only relevant CO-Emission from a nuclear plant are created while building the infrastructure. And that is miniscule in comparison to oil, gas and even wind and photovoltaic. Not joking.
A Quick Summary of Nuclear CO2 Emissions (Score:2)
The only relevant CO-Emission from a nuclear plant are created while building the infrastructure.
C02 emissions from nuclear power also occur when mining and refining the uranium ore. Roughly 70 petajoules of energy is expended per reactor acquiring fuel. For example, one third of the expected energetic output of an AP1000 reactor is spent on fueling it (from carbon based mining sources) over its service life.
There are also carbon emissions from powering the enrichment plants enriching the fuel, however those plants also output radioactive Chlorofluorocarbons (CFC114) so there are a wider spectrum o
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They probably modded you down for claiming his post was "nuked" (pun intended?) to -1 when in fact his post started at -1 because of his karma level.
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Electricity isn't going away and will keep going up especially with electric cars.
There's a group of people in the US Navy dedicated to developing a process that can extract CO2 and hydrogen from seawater, add electricity, then produce jet fuel.
It's inefficient. You aren't going to realistically power cars with such synthetic fuel at a price people are likely to want to pay compared to EVs, which would be cheaper. The USN isn't very concerned with cost here, just having the option of creating jet fuel. Put it this way, electricity from nuclear is already on the high end in terms of cost, so it makes little sense to use it to make expensive liquid fuel compared to charging EVs. If you have a process which requires continuous flows (typical for effi
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People get wrapped up in the thermodynamic efficiency
Yes, because it leads into cost. Synthetic fuels, unless an efficient stop-start process is available will not be economic compared to using electricity in EVs.
I expect the plug-in hybrid to be the long term winner on the ICEV vs. BEV debate
Since government mandates and direction in most of the world is for ICEVs, that seems unlikely. Unless you can demonstrate that there will be insufficient power and that synthetic fuels can be produced at sufficiently low cost, and I don't think you can You haven't yet despite many posts.
Re:All for research and subsidies for Nuclear (Score:5, Insightful)
While it doesn't address all of your points, actually reprocessing the existing waste will result in net reduction of the waste while providing power. That will reduce some of that unfair burden already placed on future generations.
Federal strings attached could help by making sure the decomissioning costs are taken off the top of the profits and held in escrow.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
They are already doing that. The problem is the escrows *still* are not big enough. Frankly, until private insurance is willing to cover decommissioning cost over runs, there's just too much risk. I mean consider what the costs of decommissioning Fukishima are going to be.
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Frankly, until private insurance is willing to cover decommissioning cost over runs, there's just too much risk. I mean consider what the costs of decommissioning Fukishima are going to be.
There's not likely to be any private insurance company large enough to cover decommissioning. That's been true for large civil projects going back hundreds of years. If we held everything to that standard then no large wind, solar, wave, hydro, or such project could be made. Because there is savings in economy of scale that means driving up costs by breaking the project into small enough pieces for private insurance.
It's bullshit like this that's been a backdoor ban on nuclear power projects for decades.
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Frankly, until private insurance is willing to cover decommissioning cost over runs, there's just too much risk. I mean consider what the costs of decommissioning Fukishima are going to be.
There's not likely to be any private insurance company large enough to cover decommissioning.
Subsidy to the rescue?
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over subsidy, I'd prefer to see direct government research.
The government does a lot of direct research, especially in the USA.
Re: All for research and subsidies for Nuclear (Score:2)
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That's false. Every reactor has money saved up for decommissioning. The only time there is not enough is if the plant was forced to shut down early.
nope [cleantechnica.com], but even in the few cases where it is true, the plants are not being forced to shut down early to make people feel good, but because they have defects. That is not an argument in favor of nuclear power, at all. It is however a fine example of the Streisand Effect, so thanks for that.
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Most US plants have the money saved up. Some , such as SONGS, will be expensive and does not have the money. Others like Zion will cost less than $400M and Ft. St. Vrain cost less than $200 M.
However, with SMRs, the construction AND deconstruction costs are MINIMAL. That is the why we need to go forward with these.
First, the reactors and core plumbing are constructed at a factory, which it is much easier to control QA, and COSTS.
To put these on-site will take less than 6 months and likel
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Re:All for research and subsidies for Nuclear (Score:5, Insightful)
I think you're thinking about it wrong.
Every EVERY method of power generation has a footprint. And a waste product. Including wind and solar.
Nuclear power plants take a considerably smaller footprint (literally land footprint) per GW of generation ability compared to Wind and Solar. Which means we can leave the rest of the land quite literally to nature.
And the waste product, while it requires careful management, is actually of such limited volume you can consider storing it ALL in a hole in the ground (ie: yucca mountain). You can't even fathom that with used windmill blades (that are build of a composite we don't know how to recycle yet) and solar panels (that we are also struggling to learn how to recycle well).
I've seen figures that if I powered my entire high energy life off of nuclear power, my waste FOR MY WHOLE LIFE would fit in a coffee cup. If you do the "waste refinement / recycling" they talk about here, it shrinks to 1 cubic inch.
Yea, am I "leaving something to my future generations" to manage. But, it's like ... 1 cubic inch.
That seems pretty damn responsible compared to everything we're doing now.
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I agree we should be reprocessing waste. I think the first experimental plants should be in areas where people are pro-nuclear. With that plus the jobs created it might actually happen.
Based on the behavior of chemical companies I have some concerns. The country is littered with toxic sites because they cut costs, didn't follow regulations, etc. So I think the first reprocessing should be a government project with gold plated safety standards that includes some kind of auditing/safety commission that in
Re:All for research and subsidies for Nuclear (Score:4, Insightful)
While it doesn't address all of your points, actually reprocessing the existing waste will result in net reduction of the waste.
The waste is already in an extremely compact form and well contained form - spent fuel rods. Storing the rods above ground in concrete casks, as is currently being done presents no problems other than minimal site maintenance and security. The rods are stable indefinitely.
Reprocessing produces larger volumes of radioactive waste from the chemical processes involved. This is more waste not less, even though the waste contains lower levels of actinides.
This is true of all of the reprocessing technologies that are available. The new kid in town, pyro-processing, produces the least additional waste but has poor net extraction of long lived actinides (that is, the waste still contains substantial amounts of very long lived radionuclides), the salt product is hard to dispose of, and it has never been used on a commercial scale..
Re:All for research and subsidies for Nuclear (Score:4, Insightful)
Reprocessing produces larger volumes of radioactive waste from the chemical processes involved.
Nope. Modern reprocessing allows to recycle the spent reagents pretty much indefinitely, so they don't contribute to the waste stream.
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France has the biggest nuclear waste problem on the planet.
France has the world's highest share of nuclear energy per capita. Duh.
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Storing the rods above ground in concrete casks, as is currently being done presents no problems other than minimal site maintenance and security. The rods are stable indefinitely.
The rods might be, the casks are not. Dry casks fail due to a combination of corrosion and embrittlement, which is why they are not considered suitable for use at the yucca mountain site. The cask is not purely concrete.
Reprocessing produces larger volumes of radioactive waste from the chemical processes involved. This is more waste not less, even though the waste contains lower levels of actinides.
And it raises costs, while nuclear is already the most expensive form of power.
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Don't waste your time with dinkpoo on this subject.
You do realize that when anonymous cowards attempt to defame me, users are going to take it as an endorsement? If that's your goal, thanks I guess. But if not, thanks anyway, I guess.
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I wouldn't consider a fuel rod with 5% nuclear waste and 95% usable material to be "compact" storage. Once the rods cool off enough for dry storage, they need to be reprocessed for the waste to become "compact". Notably, the actual waste from the reprocessing only needs 250-500 years to decay to the level of background radiation.
As has been pointed out, there are newer reprocessing techniques that produce less waste. A nice side benefit is they result in perfectly good fuel for the right reactor types that
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While it doesn't address all of your points, actually reprocessing the existing waste will result in net reduction of the waste while providing power. That will reduce some of that unfair burden already placed on future generations.
They do this in France and what it does is make nuclear more expensive, which means less money for renewables. Meanwhile, even without reprocessing, nuclear is the most expensive option. There's simply no contortions which make nuclear make sense under capitalism. If profit were not involved I could maybe see it, but even then it has big problems which make it less than sensible.
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I'm all for renewables, but there remains the matter of availability. We need power 100% of the time, even on windless overcast days.
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I'm all for renewables, but there remains the matter of availability. We need power 100% of the time, even on windless overcast days.
Renewables plus storage are cheaper than coal [latimes.com], let alone nuclear.
Also, if you build out the grid, you can bring in power from where it is produced. And you have to do this whether you use nuclear or renewables, because nuclear power plants are not sited at the point of consumption for a variety of reasons, and represent a large amount of production at a single point. For some renewables, no grid improvements need to be made whatsoever, because they are located at the point of consumption. For others, it's no more than they would have to be made for nuclear.
Further, nuclear causes load problems, it does not solve them. We have to use more peaker plants because we use nuclear, and it's not economical to follow load with nuclear. Some designs just can't even do it reasonably.
TL;DR: the availability objection is bullshit
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The same storage can work for nuclear. Run at little above base, use the storage to shave the peaks. Most days, the wind and solar will be at max about the time of the peaks, so they have a contribution to make for peaking as well.
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The same storage can work for nuclear.
If you have the storage, you don't need nuclear. And the only thing that would cost more than nuclear would be nuclear plus storage.
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But-- I don't think nuclear is needed for more than base line power and it has as ton of issues around waste, decommissioning, and lack of insurance (so any cost overruns pass straight to consumers).
You post this after you read the article and watched the video that had a subject matter expert address those very concerns? Oh, right, this is Slashdot, people post comments after only reading half the headline.
I also feel that nuclear is immoral or unethical because the model is "we get cheaper power and executives get big salary but the any excess costs are going to be paid by people not even born yet, most of whom will not get any cheaper power."
I think larger escrows are in order. And I was appalled that in that one state they just flat out put an extra charge on consumers when the plant wasn't as profitable as promised.
How old are you? You didn't learn yet that if a company stops making a profit that they go out of business? If the electric rates were not raised then the only other option was to not provide power. It would be nice to have another option, but that's not the world we live in.
If you run a busines
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But-- I don't think nuclear is needed for more than base line power and it has as ton of issues around waste, decommissioning...
Which is the point of the article: you don't have to dispose of or store long term waste if you use it as fuel. This has always perplexed me. If the waste is radioactive enough to be dangerous, that means it has a lot of energy left in it. If it doesn't have energy, it's not dangerous. Why are we intentionally throwing away 90%+ of the value in the fuel? It's so (as it were) wasteful.
and lack of insurance (so any cost overruns pass straight to consumers).
Insurance might be nice but few companies insure against business success or failure. Does a local restaurant get insurance i
Old news. (Score:3)
We know, and have known for decades. What's missing is political will and economics.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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And reprocessing has always been an option. But China has spent 50mstudying the issue and going for vitrification. It is like we can recycle 100% of plastic, but we are not going to.
It is often confounding trying understand t
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And it may not be as practice as the those looking for government hand out believe. In my day it was that government was suppressing water as fuel source for cars. And cars can run on water. A battery for hydrolysis, then burn the hydrogen. Simple, efficient, but the guvment is evil
I presume you are joking, given how inefficient that would be. Plus a typical ICEV won't run well on hydrogen, if at all.
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a typical ICEV won't run well on hydrogen, if at all.
With the correct ignition timing it will run great until the hot metal parts suck up hydrogen and break due to embrittlement. It embrittles ferrous metals [imetllc.com] and even aluminum [sciencedirect.com]. You can convert pretty much any ICEV to run on pretty much any gaseous fuel, but some make more sense than others. LPG is the usual conversion fuel. Diesel and otto cycle engines can both run on LPG with zero mechanical modifications. It's also not uncommon to add propane and nitrous together to older diesels, or instead you can upgrade
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a typical ICEV won't run well on hydrogen, if at all.
With the correct ignition timing it will run great until the hot metal parts suck up hydrogen and break due to embrittlement.
To me, that means not well. OK, maybe well enough, but not for long enough to make it worthwhile.
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Now that we have viable hydrogen fuel cells it's just idiotic to run an ICE on hydrogen. It requires expensive alloys and/or coatings, and the efficiency, performance, and reliability are garbage by comparison.
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Why would you use synthetic fuels? Grow algae in salt pans using seawater, centrifuge it and put the lipids into a hydrocracker and put the rest into the ABE process, making butanol from it. Most of the energy is free and comes from the sun, even for pumping the water inland (which can be done with solar thermal heat pipes).
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Why would you use synthetic fuels? Grow algae in salt pans using seawater
It's unproven at scale.
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I wish the nuclear playboys would admit that about SMRs, and molten salt, and every other thing they think is going to make nuclear power viable
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cars can run on water. A battery for hydrolysis, then burn the hydrogen. Simple, efficient, but the guvment is evil
You're mocking the people that believe this, right? This is Slashdot, so it's hard to tell.
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and economics.
If it's not economic it's unlikely to happen unless government policy tips the playing field to make it happen, e.g., carbon taxes to internalise externalities into the market.
Sounds Good But (Score:2)
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Yes, there's a reason why the SuperPhenix project was abandoned in France. Also making a molten salt reactor with a coolant that can spontaneously combust if exposed to open air does not seem like a super idea.
The best way to go would be to reuse waste into standard reactors. Some current-gen reactors can and do already run with MOX, which is basically reprocessed waste.
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There was also the concern of having bomb building materials just sitting somewhere too. And now with ICS (Industrial Control Systems) being what they are, enrichment systems and control systems at these facilities could potentially be compromised.
The USA proved that w/ StuxNet in Iran, state sponsored adversaries doing the same to us is a very high concern on the fed gov't side.
The cold war: A different time for atomic energy (Score:5, Insightful)
In the cold war, when the technology for nuclear reactors started, you needed two types of reactors:
1.) Reactors that were safe and reliable (with the technologies of the era) AND could produce Uranium/Plutonium for A/H bombs.
2.) Reactors that were safe and reliable (with the technologies of the era) AND were compact enough to fit in things like aircraft carriers and Submarines.
This meant that most of the research money and comercial interest and impetus went to the type of reactors we see now (heavy water, light water, carbon rod moderated and such), leaving other technologies (like molten sodium reactors, peeble reactors and such) as nice experiemnts and nothing more.
With the cold war "behind" us, and treaties limiting (and sometimes even diminishing) the amount of bombs that the main atomic superpowers have, is no wonder that old designs/technologies that are safer and more efficient with the fuel (but that do not aid the "cold war" effort) are being dusted off and re-researched...
France is one of the counties with the biggest % of their electricity produced by atomics, so , is fittint to finish my post with the sage words of Gaston LaGaffe:
M'enfin
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Wasn't Gaston Belgian?
vous avez raison
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This is untrue. Check the list of fast neutron reactors that have been built over the years: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Clearly very significant funding has gone into fast neutron reactor research. It's just that they create as many problems as they solve and will never be commercially viable.
In particular, they still produce waste that must be stored for 500 years before it comes safe, and require difficult to handle and often toxic coolant since water can't be used (water is a neutron moderator). Co
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WHile the article talks specifically about fast neutron reactors, The general idea of the article was of "safer less waste producing reactors".
That's why, in my comment I never mentioned "Fast Neutron Reactors" even once.
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What other type of less waste producing reactors are there that haven't had a lot of investment or development?
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What other type of less waste producing reactors are there that haven't had a lot of investment or development?
The ones I named. peeble nuclear reactors and molten sodium nuclear reactors...
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We tried those too, they were disasters as well. Expensive failures, decades away from commercial scale, and unclear if they will ever be economically viable.
Maybe once we get the climate crisis under control we can dick around with those again.
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Please feel free to ignore any comments made on nuclear subjects by AmiMoJo. Her only purpose on this subject will be to spread FUD using out of date data. No discussion you have on this subject with her will have any effect, and will only serve to waste your time. There are other forum members that actually follow the science and discussions should be continued with that in mind.
Thanks, saw your warning a little late, but will pove useful in the future...
You could also use a non-critical reactor desing (Score:3)
One that creates neutrons via spallation. Much safer designm, as they cannot meltdown:
http://wavewatching.net/2012/0... [wavewatching.net]
Added bonus, these reactors can also transmute long lasting nuclear waste into much less problematic isotopes.
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This is not correct, neutrons are produced directly as by-product of nuclear fission. Since the fission reaction produces more neutrons than it absorbed this can lead to a runaway chain reaction. The latter is by design in a nuclear weapon, but very much not wanted in a reactor, as it can cause an uncontrolled core melt-down.
If fission material is suitable small such a chain reaction cannot be entertained as to many neutrons escape (to be preci
CANDU reactors (Score:3)
Are not CANDU reactors this type of reactor?
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CANDU reactors are a lot of things, they are very flexible about the fuel in them. They are not fast reactors, but they can still be used to destroy waste products found in "spent" fuel rods from light water reactors. ("Spent" is in quotes because the rods are "spent" as far as light water reactors are concerned but for a heavy water reactor they could be considered "enriched".)
It's possible to build a CANDU or similar heavy water reactor so it can use the fuel rod from a light water reactor with no modif
British Energy (Score:3)
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Two fast breeder reactors were built at Dounreay in Scotland. Both of them were fiascos.
Emissions of radioactive material were so bad that they had to ban fishing in the area. Later a digger cut through the backup power supply line, which lead to an investigation that uncovered multiple failings of management and safety.
The French also tried building them, but also ran into problems and very high costs.
Renewables better be enough because we can't afford to keep pissing money away on nuclear, and in any case
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When I was a kid the British nuclear energy company (I can't remember what it was called at the time, British Energy maybe) ran adverts on TV about how they can reprocess nuclear fuel to be used again. So I assume we've known about this for at least 30 years, but only France has really committed to and invested in nuclear energy.
Nuclear energy is expensive, even in France, and reusing fuel makes it much more expensive. They made the decisions based on french national defense, which is funny because that's historically not much of a thing. It only really makes sense if you think of yourself as an island, which is also not a thing for France.
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The trouble is, price estimates for nuclear power generation in the UK and France originally assigned an arbitrarily high value to Pu239 because it was considered a strategically important material, both for building their own nuclear arsenals and, in the case of the UK, for selling to the US where demand for Pu239 for building nuclear weapons outstripped the local supply.
The trouble is, demand for Pu239 wasn't high for very long. Once you've got enough nuclear warheads to obliterate the world a few times
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The US banned it over proliferation fears (Score:3)
The US did have spent fuel reprocessing for a while but they banned it because one of the steps in the process produces nuclear material of the sort that could be used to make a nuclear bomb and the US was scared of what might happen if the "wrong people" were able to get their hands on that.
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This has generally been my impression with nuclear: The better you are at using spent fuel, the closer you are to having weapons grade material. Hence, the US wants to keep it generally harmless and limited. Do you know if I'm wildly off base in this assumption?
pretty sure (Score:2)
I'm pretty sure fast-breeder reactors have been long understood, and deliberately not commercialized because what they pump out is DELIGHTFULLY easy to turn into a nuclear bomb, far more so than uranium.
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And this would stop who from building them?
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Carter signed a treaty saying that the US wouldn't build that type of reactor.
I'm pretty hard right. But this "feels like a job for the UN." A few "breaders" aka "recyclers" aka "refiners" positioned ... somewhere somewhat neutral that could reprocess the worlds waste into fuel again. Highly HIGHLY staffed by people from lots of nations and heavily monitored to make sure everybody knows what's going in and out of the place.
The place ... is a sticking point I know. You'd almost need to make "UN Islan
Carter's Policy statement on Nuclear matters. (Score:2)
Carter signed a treaty saying that the US wouldn't build that type of reactor.
Do you have a link to that? I could only find the NNPT was signed by Johnson and Nixon.
I found that Carter was a big supporter of the nuclear industry and that in Carter's discussion on the subject of nuclear matters [nrc.gov] he simply withdrew federal support for the breeders and enrichment that lead to nuclear weapons proliferation.
No, he did not (Score:2)
It is long past time for reactors like Natrium along with Moltex.
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You are not paying attention (Score:2)
True? Biden's Chance At Redemption (Score:2)
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INTEGRAL Fast Reactor (Score:2)
So the EBR-II project was the prototype for a thing called the "Integral Fast Reactor" which is not mentioned in this article.
The key distinction in this type of "fast" reactor is that it is a "burner" reactor as opposed to a "breeder" reactor.
A breeder reactor creates plutonium where as a burner reactor creates fissile ash. That makes burner reactors a "anti-proliferation" device as weapons grade plutonium and DU can be used as fuel, which is an important aspect of solving the waste issue accompanyin
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I would not be opposed to restarting the project IFF it is 100% funded up front and the dems, esp. the GOON SQUAD, are not allowed to stop it.
PNAS is making laughing stock of American science (Score:2)
Then for the last 20 years, China (and other Asian science) has been a total joke. With CHina, it was easily 1/3 upwards to 1/2 of their science was bogus.
Now, I read this kind of garbage that is obviously as