Safe Nuclear Power

[Airbrush]

Did anyone see the recent documentary called "Pandora's Promise"?

 

It is about the history of nuclear power and nuclear disasters. Most of the 1-hour documentary shows in great detail the effects of nuclear disasters at Fukushima, Chernoble, and 3-Mile Island. All of these reactors were inherently unsafe. The FOURTH generation of nuclear power plants are designed to be very safe. In fact they are impossible to melt down, no matter what happens. Does anyone else believe that nuclear power is a great potential for safe, clean energy?

 

See "pandoraspromise.com", since I cannot copy and paste links any longer. Does anyone else have that problem?

[Acme]

Did anyone see the recent documentary called "Pandora's Promise"?

 

It is about the history of nuclear power and nuclear disasters. Most of the 1-hour documentary shows in great detail the effects of nuclear disasters at Fukushima, Chernoble, and 3-Mile Island. All of these reactors were inherently unsafe. The FOURTH generation of nuclear power plants are designed to be very safe. In fact they are impossible to melt down, no matter what happens. Does anyone else believe that nuclear power is a great potential for safe, clean energy?

 

See "pandoraspromise.com", since I cannot copy and paste links any longer. Does anyone else have that problem?

Didn't see the program and no time just now. Is it about pebble-bed reactors?

 

On the copy/paste; yes a number of us. Quick fix is to click the toggle switch on the extreme left corner of the edit box and it puts you in a simple text mode that you can paste to. (There's a thread here on this but not sure where.)

 

Edit: Here is where I ASKED ABOUT IT. >> http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/7785-quick-forum-questions/?p=788481

Edited April 3, 2014 by Acme

[Airbrush]

Thanks Acme, I will try that when I have time.

I don't recall "pebble-bed reactor" in the documentary. Several of the anti-nuclear folks came to realize that the argument against nuclear power was unscientific. Apparently democrats are against nuclear power simply because republicans are for it.

Didn't see the program and no time just now. Is it about pebble-bed reactors?

On the copy/paste; yes a number of us. Quick fix is to click the toggle switch on the extreme left corner of the edit box and it puts you in a simple text mode that you can paste to. (There's a thread here on this but not sure where.)

Edit: Here is where I ASKED ABOUT IT. >> http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/7785-quick-forum-questions/?p=788481

IT WORKS!! Thank you Acme.

 

"....The atomic bomb and meltdowns like Fukushima have made nuclear power synonymous with global disaster. But what if we’ve got nuclear power wrong? An audience favorite at the Sundance Film Festival, PANDORA’S PROMISE asks whether the one technology we fear most could save our planet from a climate catastrophe, while providing the energy needed to lift billions of people in the developing world out of poverty. In his controversial new film, Stone tells the intensely personal stories of environmentalists and energy experts who have undergone a radical conversion from being fiercely anti to strongly pro-nuclear energy, risking their careers and reputations in the process. Stone exposes this controversy within the environmental movement head-on with stories of defection by heavy weights including Stewart Brand, Richard Rhodes, Gwyneth Cravens, Mark Lynas and Michael Shellenberger. Undaunted and fearlessly independent, PANDORA’S PROMISE is a landmark work that is forever changing the conversation about the myths and science behind this deeply emotional and polarizing issue."

 

http://pandoraspromise.com

Edited April 4, 2014 by Airbrush

[Enthalpy]

Reactors and inherently safe before building them. At worse, their drawing catches fire. The rest is bullshit.

 

Safety comes from good design which results from engineers' experience. It does not result from a few general ideas, and far less from wishes and from CEO claims.

 

Though, as each company makes a new reactor design every third decade, its engineers have zero experience, hence their design is unsafe, if not completely meaningless. Every reactor design is a first attempt, with all the related faults.

 

I also read that BS of inherent safety about the EPR. Meanwhile, we heard that

- The control rods would have been expelled by an overpressure in the vessel;

- The supervision network and software were not separated from the control;

which are both absolute beginners' mistakes that wouldn't have been accepted in a chemical plant for instance.

 

Not only did such gross mistakes pass through the developer company, they also passed through the national committee for nuclear safety. Shame, it were two foreign committees which saw the gross flaws and said stop.

 

When you hear someone claim safety, just remember that prior to Fukushima, convincing people demonstrated that the risk of loosing all power needed to cool a reactor was ludicrously small. Not only would the reactor have to stop; it would also need to lose the external power from the line, and all the redundent backup generators - unimaginable.

 

Remember as well that a hydrogen explosion had been described in detail as a risk, and parries proposed - but hydrogen explosion was considered a frenzy scenario invented by a paranoid green.

 

If that weren't enough, you may think at what happens if an enemy armed force bombards a nuclear reactor, as it uses to do at the beginning of a war. Bunker breaker bombs easily pierce any reactor and disperse its radioactivity, in a Chernobyl-sized catastrophy multiplied by the number of plants. Ton-sized kinetic energy weapons would scatter a reactor more widely, and almost certainly let detonate a fast-neutron reactor like a plutonium bomb.

[Acme]

Reactors and[sic] inherently safe before building them. At worse[sic], their drawing[sic] catches[sic] fire. The rest is bullshit.

 

...the rest

One could make the same argument for automobiles and bicycles. Life is inherently a risk and the best the living can do is attempt a well-reasoned balance between risk & reward.

[Schneibster]

There's another reactor design concept that's got some advantages similar to pebble bed reactors: Traveling Wave Reactors or TWRs. These have the advantage that they burn up everything radioactive and leave cold, radiologically inert (though potentially requiring chemical treatment) waste. So they're also more efficient, i.e. more kilowatts per kilogram of fuel.

 

First, they are non-proliferating since there's nothing left when they're done burning the fuel; second, they cannot melt down; and there are many other advantages.

 

In other words, we've solved this trick two ways.

 

I disagree with some of the statements about the various accidents, and also point out that the problems at TMI, Fukushima, and Chernobyl were not in any way similar, nor were any of them similar to several other accidents that weren't mentioned. There's a lot to be discussed, and some of it is in the political realm; from an engineering point of view, however, it's more a matter of going and doing it than inventing anything we don't already know how to do.

 

And this is a discussion that is becoming more crucial by the day as we continue to watch India and China build coal power plants.

Edited April 6, 2014 by Schneibster

[Airbrush]

Enthalpy, could you please watch "Pandora's Promise" and report back to us SPECIFICALLY what is wrong with it? It was made by anti-nuke people who converted back to a belief that nuclear power is a good energy source, at least until safer renewables are up and running.

[Johnny Electriglide]

It looks like a great and very much needed documentary. In Hansen's "Storms of My Grandchildren"(2009), he stressed the importance of immediately replacing all coal and other fossil fuel power plants with GEN IV designs forcibly scrapped by Clinton in 1994. In his 2006 documentary he gave us a decade to do this, while 350.org gives us until 2024 to reduce all HGHGs 90%, or cross the 2*C deemed dangerous by 2036. In the past a rise of 1.5*C was devastating but did not trigger the tundra methane positive feedback loop. That happens at around 1.8*C, so 2*C is too far. I went ,all solar 16 years ago, but a lot of good it will do in the long run.

[Enthalpy]

There's another reactor design concept that's got some advantages similar to pebble bed reactors: Traveling Wave Reactors or TWRs. These have the advantage that they burn up everything radioactive and leave cold, radiologically inert (though potentially requiring chemical treatment) waste. So they're also more efficient, i.e. more kilowatts per kilogram of fuel.

 

There is absolutely nothing that works that little bit in the travelling wave reactor - so we don't even need to discuss the wrong claims about its advantages.

 

Though, some crooks were smart enough to sell it, without any sensible technical basis, to Bill Gates. The good news is that Mr. Gates can perfectly survive with a few millions less.

Enthalpy, could you please watch "Pandora's Promise" and report back to us SPECIFICALLY what is wrong with it? It was made by anti-nuke people who converted back to a belief that nuclear power is a good energy source, at least until safer renewables are up and running.

 

Sorry, I've neither the Internet volume nor the time for it.

 

Anyway, "generation IV" is a marketing name for a dozen of very different reactors, some completely impractical, others with blatant drawbacks. Claiming "generation IV is safe" while it designates such a diversity isn't very sensible.

 

What's absolutely certain: any nuclear reactor, whatever its design or "generation", burst by a bomb or a kinetic impactor, pollutes as much as Chernobyl.

 

Putting an "anti-nuke" tag on a few propagandists is easy, and the nuclear industry pays many people full-time as propagandists. I can just as well tell that I was a nuke enthusiast until I realized the drawbacks.

 

Safe renewables run every day. Wind electricity is already cheaper than nuclear one. In Solar thermal plants, energy is already stored to provide electricity during night. Convincing ideas, both technically and economicaly, exist to store electricity; we must develop them, and this is a matter of millions, not tens of billions for nukes.

Edited April 6, 2014 by Enthalpy

[Schneibster]

 

There is absolutely nothing that works that little bit in the travelling wave reactor - so we don't even need to discuss the wrong claims about its advantages.

 

Though, some crooks were smart enough to sell it, without any sensible technical basis, to Bill Gates. The good news is that Mr. Gates can perfectly survive with a few millions less.

 

What does "There is absolutely nothing that works that little bit" mean on Earth?

[faslan]

Using Thorium Reactors instead of uranium will be a clean nuclear energy

[Enthalpy]

 

What does "There is absolutely nothing that works that little bit" mean on Earth?

 

On Earth nor anywhere else, the travelling wave reactor doesn't work.

Using Thorium Reactors instead of uranium will be a clean nuclear energy

 

Even the Indian engineers, who spent such a big effort on thorium reactors, have abandoned the hope of breeding with thorium reactors. Thorium reactors will always need additional plutonium made by uranium reactors, which are limited by the abundance of natural ²³⁵U.

 

That is: with the natural ²³⁵U, one can fuel uranium reactors, or less directly thorium reactors, and in both cases, this natural abundence limits the available energy. Only a tiny proportion of the available thorium can be used.

 

In addition, thorium reactors would be extremely proliferant. Having the fast neutron core, the customer country could just replace the thorium blankets with uranium to get ²³⁹Pu. And anyway, two bombs using ²³³U were already detonated.

 

Then you have the risk of a nuclear explosion, just like a plutonium bomb, if a kinetic impactor weapon hits a fast neutron core, including at a thorium breeder reactor.

 

For the same use of thorium needing plutonium, one can just burn a plutonium-thorium mix in a normal uranium-water reactor. It's already done in VVER. No additional money waste needed.

[Airbrush]

That seems like a reasonable argument that a great proliferation of nuclear reactors, even in unstable areas, would become prime targets for terrorism. Does the destruction of a nuclear reactor, no matter how safe it is, create in effect a dirty bomb? A dirty bomb can make an area uninhabitable for a long time, something we have never seen before.

[Enthalpy]

Shattering a nuclear reactor disseminates the fission products it contains, whatever its technology. It's basically what happened at Chernobyl. Some countries offer 20 to 100 such targets to an assaillant. The country would be uninhabitable.

 

Battletanks have kinetic energy penetrators

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinetic_energy_penetrator

that break present reactor confinements from few km distance. Battletanks protect against radiation.

 

Bunker buster bombs would break any future reactor confinenement dome and vessel

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massive_Ordnance_Penetrator

some can be launched from a remote plane.

 

A much bigger and faster kinetic energy penetrator can be launched by a rocket from a truck at 5,000km distance. Hugely more destructive than an explosive head. This one would let a fast neutron reactor (like a breeder) detonate like a plutonium bomb, by compressing the core.

[Airbrush]

Are you sure that simply destroying a reactor results in the surrounding area becoming uninhabitable for a long time? Israel destroyed an Iraqi nuclear reactor and I don't recall hearing that that entire section of Iraq is now uninhabitable. People have moved back to the Chernobyl area with no bad effect.

 

Take France as an example, since they get 80% of their energy from nuclear power. Do you think that terrorists have the bunker busting capability to destroy a reactor? Sure they can crash an airliner into a reactor, but would that penetrate far enough?

[Enthalpy]

The Iraqi reactor had not been started.

 

The area polluted by the Chernobyl reactor is evacuated.

 

I have written "weapons" and "armed forces" and "enemy". Please don't mislead to terrorism and aeroplanes.

Edited April 8, 2014 by Enthalpy

[Airbrush]

"Chernobyl Exclusion Zone

 

An area originally extending 30 kilometres (19 mi) in all directions from the plant is officially called the "zone of alienation". It is largely uninhabited, except for about 300 residents who have refused to leave. The area has largely reverted to forest, and has been overrun by wildlife because of a lack of competition with humans for space and resources. Even today, radiation levels are so high that the workers responsible for rebuilding the sarcophagus are only allowed to work five hours a day for one month before taking 15 days of rest. Ukrainian officials estimate the area will not be safe for human life again for another 20,000 years.[57]"

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_disaster

 

In the documentary they tested some of the 300 people who chose to stay in the area, and they showed low radiation doses. Maybe it is a lie. I want to know the truth.

 

In this age of stealth, many governments should soon have the ability to attack anywhere inside of any country. That means the ability to destroy nuclear reactors at will. The idea of any populated area becoming uninhabitable for 20,000 years seems unacceptable.

 

I was not aware that the Iraq reactor Israel destroyed was only under construction.

Edited April 8, 2014 by Airbrush

[Schneibster]

 

On Earth nor anywhere else, the travelling wave reactor doesn't work.

 

 

Because...?

 

Frankly on just as much evidence as you have presented I say it does work and you are lying.

 

Update: it has been brought to my attention that this could be interpreted as me saying you're lying.

 

I'm not.

 

I'm saying, rhetorically, that you don't have any evidence. My apologies for any appearance of insult. My intent was to be sarcastic, not insulting. Please forgive me.

Edited April 8, 2014 by Schneibster

[Enthalpy]

You could have a look at the arguments of the proponents of the travelling wave reactor. These people knew very little about nuclear energy. They just said "it would be fantastic", not a word about "how" (because, anyone knows for long the potential advantages, only they didn't understand the difficulties), and this was enough to pull money from Bill Gates.

 

It's impossibility results from detailed figures, which aren't even well accessible to hand computations. So there's no simple qualitative answer. But consider that any breeder is seriously difficult to bring to plutonium regeneration, using optimum conditions everywhere: shape, size, concentrated military plutonium fuel - and then the breeding figure is like one dot zero something. The travelling wave reactor would be a breeder, but under very unfavourable conditions. No chance to run.

 

Then, you may read the initial proposal by the crooks: they wanted to ignite the travelling wave using uranium - which clearly tells they don't understand the topic.

 

I wonder: how do you decide what (or who, which is a less good choice) you want to believe? The ones you read first? Or the proposal that fits your desires better? Be reassured that it's not my personal opinion: the whole nuke community considers for decades the travelling wave reactor as an obvious impossibility.

[Danijel Gorupec]

hmm... Is anyone saying that the nuclear energy is not safe already? On what ground?

Many kids are truly terrified of the closet monsters, but those kids are never in a real danger. When most people say "how dangerous reactors are", they actually mean "how scary reactors are". Because this is an engineering forum, I expect clear wording here. What is it about nuclear reactors needs an urgent improvement - their safety record or public opinion about them?

Yes, I think that we should improve the nuclear reactor safety records a lot! As well as for cars, airplanes, drugs, food and anything else...

What causes me a great pain is when I hear an engineer saying "this is bad, throw it away" instead of "this is bad, it should be improved". What kind of an engineer would not like to try to improve something? Nuclear energy is a recent discovery and a new technology - we do not throw away discoveries that easy! New technologies are only found once in a hundred years.

I don't think that public opinion about nuclear energy is healthy at the moment. Even if we declare present technology as too dangerous, the "destroy all and stop everything" public stance seems unhealthy. At least some positive attitude to future technology research should be present. We engineers failed to provoke at least that.

Anyway, my answer to the OP is: you posted it in the wrong forum. Engineers cannot make that technology appear safe to the public any more - it is too late. Rebranding is needed - please contact the marketing department.

 

Reactors and inherently safe before building them. At worse, their drawing catches fire. The rest is bullshit.

...the rest

 

Acme, this was hilarious! Did you do it on purpose? It is not that I agree with your quoting, but I still find it funny ... I almost missed it.

[Acme]

 

 

Reactors and inherently safe before building them. At worse, their drawing catches fire. The rest is bullshit.

...the rest

 

Acme, this was hilarious! Did you do it on purpose? It is not that I agree with your quoting, but I still find it funny ... I almost missed it.

 

Yes thank you. On purpose with humorous and pointed purpose. Batting 500 ain't bad.

 

...I don't think that public opinion about nuclear energy is healthy at the moment. Even if we declare present technology as too dangerous, the "destroy all and stop everything" public stance seems unhealthy. At least some positive attitude to future technology research should be present. ...

I agree. I was trying to make a similar point with my comment on cars and bicycles. Our highways and byways are smeared in blood and no one is suggesting we get rid of cars and bikes. The way I see it, perception is everything.

 

Some more of the rest...

 

...If that weren't enough, you may think at what happens if an enemy armed force bombards a nuclear reactor, as it uses to do at the beginning of a war. Bunker breaker bombs easily pierce any reactor and disperse its radioactivity, in a Chernobyl-sized catastrophy multiplied by the number of plants. Ton-sized kinetic energy weapons would scatter a reactor more widely, and almost certainly let detonate a fast-neutron reactor like a plutonium bomb.

Ooooooo scary!! Bunker busters, piercing, kinetic energy weapons, oh my!! Phhhhhhh. Pop a major hydroelectric dam and get similar results to attacking a nuclear power plant. Thousands of deaths and billions of dollars in property damage right off the bat. Land rendered unusable for decades, billions for cleanup, & the secondary damages related to the loss of generating capacity. Damn dams! Unsafe I tell ya. Much better that we burn fossil fuels and slowly choke everyone to death than build safer nuclear power plants. Muahahahahah....

Edited April 10, 2014 by Acme

[Schneibster]

You could have a look at the arguments of the proponents of the travelling wave reactor. These people knew very little about nuclear energy. They just said "it would be fantastic", not a word about "how" (because, anyone knows for long the potential advantages, only they didn't understand the difficulties), and this was enough to pull money from Bill Gates.

 

It's impossibility results from detailed figures, which aren't even well accessible to hand computations. So there's no simple qualitative answer. But consider that any breeder is seriously difficult to bring to plutonium regeneration, using optimum conditions everywhere: shape, size, concentrated military plutonium fuel - and then the breeding figure is like one dot zero something. The travelling wave reactor would be a breeder, but under very unfavourable conditions. No chance to run.

 

Then, you may read the initial proposal by the crooks: they wanted to ignite the travelling wave using uranium - which clearly tells they don't understand the topic.

 

I wonder: how do you decide what (or who, which is a less good choice) you want to believe? The ones you read first? Or the proposal that fits your desires better? Be reassured that it's not my personal opinion: the whole nuke community considers for decades the travelling wave reactor as an obvious impossibility.

 

Unfortunately my research indicates that you are presenting the narrow viewpoint of one nuclear engineer, Kirk Sorenson. The community does not agree. Also, Sorenson's firm is in direct competition with TerraPower, which unfortunately makes him a biased source with a financial interest in the outcome of the argument. (For observers: TerraPower is the company Enthalpy is complaining about getting money from Bill Gates.)

 

Furthermore you have not addressed the consumption of existing nuclear waste, which can be accomplished with no other type of reactor at all. Do you prefer keeping it in a mountain near your town, or in the pools next to the reactors where it can participate in the next nuclear accident like it did at Fukushima? There are already thousands of tons of it. What's your solution?

 

On edit: What's the matter with using ²³⁵U to start the reaction?

Edited April 10, 2014 by Schneibster

[Enthalpy]

[about military weapons bursting nuclear reactors]

 

Ooooooo scary!! Bunker busters, piercing, kinetic energy weapons, oh my!! Phhhhhhh. Pop a major hydroelectric dam and get similar results to attacking a nuclear power plant. Thousands of deaths and billions of dollars in property damage right off the bat. Land rendered unusable for decades, billions for cleanup, & the secondary damages related to the loss of generating capacity. Damn dams! Unsafe I tell ya. Much better that we burn fossil fuels and slowly choke everyone to death than build safer nuclear power plants. Muahahahahah....

 

When the arguments fail, try style?

 

Dams have already been rust by weapons, and nuclear reactors have already exploded, so we can compare. The dam inundates a valley for some weeks, the nuclear reactor renders a region unuseable for centuries.

 

Unfortunately my research indicates that you are presenting the narrow viewpoint of one nuclear engineer, Kirk Sorenson. The community does not agree. Also, Sorenson's firm is in direct competition with TerraPower, which unfortunately makes him a biased source with a financial interest in the outcome of the argument. (For observers: TerraPower is the company Enthalpy is complaining about getting money from Bill Gates.)

 

Furthermore you have not addressed the consumption of existing nuclear waste, which can be accomplished with no other type of reactor at all. Do you prefer keeping it in a mountain near your town, or in the pools next to the reactors where it can participate in the next nuclear accident like it did at Fukushima? There are already thousands of tons of it. What's your solution?

 

On edit: What's the matter with using ²³⁵U to start the reaction?

 

It is my opinion that the proposed travelling wave reactor doesn't work. I don't need other sources for that. And yes, the community does agree. An no, checking who says what and supposedly why does not make a scientific opinion; these are a most propaganda methods.

 

Terra Power proposed starting the travelling wave reactor, which would be a breeder with unfavourable geometry, using ²³⁵U. This proves definitely that TerraPower doesn't know the job. Only plutonium provides enough neutrons per fission to make a breeder, because a breeder needs not only on neutron for the next fission, but also one neutron to breed the next fissile nucleus. That's common knowledge about breeders, perfectly agreed by "the community". So well known that I wonder why you challenge this but put my knowledge in question.

 

The other claims by Terra Power are just wrong, including the consumption of nuclear waste. The question is instead: why do you, why should anyone, believe a group of crooks?

[Moontanman]

LFTR technology looks promising...

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_fluoride_thorium_reactor

[Enthalpy]

LFTR have never worked. And once again, thorium reactors need plutonium, so they demand uranium reactors, and the amount of available ²³⁵U limits how much thorium can be exploited.

 

By the way, about every criticality accident happened with liquid nuclear fuels. The claim of a molten salt reactor being safer is extremely doubtful.