Talk-Polywell.org

Does anyone care to speculate about what this means?

Obama reaffirmed his commitment to a bill in his State of the Union speech as a way to create more clean-energy jobs, but added that "means building a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants in this country."

http://apnews.excite.com/article/201001 ... OEC80.html

Support for fission plants has been building for some time among various green groups. 'Bout time.

The US plants themselves are remarkably safe. The French have an outstanding record, and standardized plant designs we lack. The two big drawbacks are nuclear arms proliferation (irrelevant to US powerplants as we already have more nuclear weapons than we want or need) and waste disposal. I notice that the article mentions Obama's opposition to Yucca Flats, the smartest nuclear waste long-term storage site we have ever had.

There were a slew of articles recently on McClatchy, via Yahoo, that had little tweaks of language that were quite revealing. The writer had an anti-nuclear bias and was trying to make the change in attitude toward nukes appear to be some nefarious consiracy. Words like "portend", "tsunami", and most vile of all, "Cheney" (usually accused of promoting oil).

http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20100 ... hy/3403257
Lobbying, global warming portend U.S. nuclear renaissance

http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20100 ... hy/3403256
U.S. 'nuclear renaissance' had roots in Bush-Cheney

http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20100 ... hy/3404219
Nuclear power's licensing demands create 'tsunami' for feds

Any idea what the "New Generation" of nuclear power plants will look like? I think current designs are up to generation 5. Which new generation will be the big winner I wonder. Or maybe it is current concepts that are up to generation 5. Will there be

- a big research push, then development, standardized design then construction
- a big development push, standardized design then construction
- a small development push then construction
- copy of the standardized French design
- no standardized design, but 3 or more new types built

Just wondering how it will (politics), and how it should (physics) go.

Tom Ligon wrote:Support for fission plants has been building for some time among various green groups. 'Bout time.

The US plants themselves are remarkably safe. The French have an outstanding record, and standardized plant designs we lack. The two big drawbacks are nuclear arms proliferation (irrelevant to US powerplants as we already have more nuclear weapons than we want or need) and waste disposal. I notice that the article mentions Obama's opposition to Yucca Flats, the smartest nuclear waste long-term storage site we have ever had.

There were a slew of articles recently on McClatchy, via Yahoo, that had little tweaks of language that were quite revealing. The writer had an anti-nuclear bias and was trying to make the change in attitude toward nukes appear to be some nefarious consiracy. Words like "portend", "tsunami", and most vile of all, "Cheney" (usually accused of promoting oil).

http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20100 ... hy/3403257
Lobbying, global warming portend U.S. nuclear renaissance

http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20100 ... hy/3403256
U.S. 'nuclear renaissance' had roots in Bush-Cheney

http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20100 ... hy/3404219
Nuclear power's licensing demands create 'tsunami' for feds

Not so much nefarious; More like business as usual. 7 of 10 of the top 10 world corporations are energy companies: http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/global500/2009/

I've been getting a kick out of the "Baptists and Bootleggers" "theory" of economic regulation lately, http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2007/0 ... le_on.html after having read it on Rod Adams blog of January 25. http://atomicinsights.blogspot.com/

H can't help but see the world energy companies as filling the "Bootlegger" role, stirring up the "baptists" advocacy for ultra low power dense power sources (relative to combustion), or no competing power sources at all, such as "nega-watts" nonsense coming out of the likes of places like the Rocky Mountain Institute.

The Yucca Mountain "solution" for Nuclear waste was way over the top, and enhanced the perception that isolated, encapsulated, sequestered spent fuel was a problem. The only "problem" it will be for the next 100 years, (if we don't want to "burn" the stuff) will be that N plant workers will have to walk further from where they park their cars.

Also I think Cheney isn't so much pro-oil, but more pro-fossil; His home state of Wyoming is so underlain with low sulfur coal that we supposedly have a coal train leaving Cheyenne ever 6 minutes.

I'm not up on what "new generation" means. The old reactors suffered from a lack of standardization, which is one of the reasons the regulatory approval process was so complex and they cost so much. The French plants are supposed to be cookie-cutter copies. They got it right the first time and built more.

Don't tell me the French can do it and we can't.

Efficiency would be higher if we could run them hotter. That requires more reactivity. There was some talk a few years ago about buying plutonium from dismantled Russian weapons to enrich fuel pellets. Nukes lose reactivity with temperature (a good thing since it makes them more stable), but it also means they don't run as hot as fossil fuel plants so their thermodynamic efficiency is lower and they need more cooling, plus some designs post-heat the steam with fossil fuels. Presumably one might make more efficient plants in this way. Design option such as sodium-cooled breeders, PWR, and BWR all affect efficiency.

Plus nukes like to run a steady base load. Enhancing the plants with short or medium-term storage, or grid enhancements to better utilize power, could all allow a higher percentage of the grid to be nuclear.
Nukes are not a good match for solar and wind power because they can't adjust to the idiosyncracies of those sources, which is an additional challenge in todays power grids.

A snide ... oops, I mean side ... comment on the current administration's politics may be in order here. In the run-up to the State of the Union Message, I heard one reporter said it would be an attempt to "get the nation behind" the President's policies.

In a sense, sorta. Picture the Prez looking over his shoulder and noticing few followers. The followers were all lined up elsewhere. So he moved to in front of where the followers were.

This may describe the switch in focus to nuclear pretty well. A lot of people are coming around to the previous administration's feelings toward nuclear because reality is forcing it. I'm OK with that ... leaders are supposed to respond to pressure from their constituents. It just makes me chuckle when a guy that got in because he represented leadership for "change" winds up being changed and led around ... will I get in trouble if I think about a bull with a ring in his nose?

I recall being a little afraid of the pressure cooker my mother used to use. It only ran at a few atmospheres. The currently operating Pressurized Light Water Reactors and Boiling Water Reactors run at above 100 Atmospheres. They're still safe because if they "pop", the steam will condense inside a reactor housing, and the continuing heat generation from decay can be managed.

The problem is that increasing the heat of the reactor (relative to the quench) necessitates an even bigger, stronger and more expensive reactor vessel. We need to bring the costs of electrical generation down!

We need both (Liquid Metal Fast Breeder Reactors (LMFBR) back on the table, as well as other designs that don't require the massive loan guarantees required for the current generations.

I worry that the recent movement by the administration is only to get above the rising tide of public opinion, and will not go so far as to develop new reactor designs that may actually begin to replace fossil fuels.

Aero wrote:Any idea what the "New Generation" of nuclear power plants will look like? I think current designs are up to generation 5. Which new generation will be the big winner I wonder. Or maybe it is current concepts that are up to generation 5.

Current plants are considered GenIII. There are a number of plants under certification that are considered GenIIIA. GenIV include most of the inherently safe reactors and a number of HTGRs. I believe the Molten Salt Reactor is designated a GenIV plant.

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

Maybe someone likes this topic well enough to post a Poll ???

KitemanSA wrote:

Aero wrote:Any idea what the "New Generation" of nuclear power plants will look like? I think current designs are up to generation 5. Which new generation will be the big winner I wonder. Or maybe it is current concepts that are up to generation 5.

Current plants are considered GenIII. There are a number of plants under certification that are considered GenIIIA. GenIV include most of the inherently safe reactors and a number of HTGRs. I believe the Molten Salt Reactor is designated a GenIV plant.

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

I believe current plants like Fitspatrick on Lake Ontario , or Yankee on the Connecticut, are more like Generation II BWRs and need replacement. That's going to be really really hard to do; They're paid for, and generate about a $1M/day in revenue, the old fashioned way: They generate and sell Electricity. (the new way: subsidy receipts). .....

Baptists, Bootleggers, and Enron:

http://powerandcontrol.blogspot.com/200 ... rking.html

My guess about "new generation" is that it is about making work (necessary?) for nuclear engineers so we will have cadre if we need them. Also design work is low cost.

They're talking about Gen III+. I wish it was Gen IV.

Josh Cryer wrote:They're talking about Gen III+. I wish it was Gen IV.

Well get yourself over there and start designing. You will know exactly the trade offs to be made to make them economically viable.

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Back to reality. Incremental improvements are a better way to go than total redesign. Total redesign can introduce totally unforeseen problems. That can be very expensive. And cause big delays.

Building III+s while working on and deploying IVs is a very good plan. If you want to be sure to have some nukes on line by date certain.

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As with the military, amateurs study tactics (design), professionals study logistics.

I suggest you guys study the AP1000. As an insider, it is quite intresting, pwr with passive safety, whether it is Gen III+ or Gen IV will depend on your viewpoint on what it takes to qualify for Gen IV.

The 58 NPPs currently in operation in France are Gen II PWRs, with a high level of standardization indeed. They were commissioned between the early 60s and 1997. They are getting a bit old. The people who built and operate them too. The same is happening in the US, just slightly worse.

When you consider deploying a large nuclear programme, you are dealing with a century time scale (I am not addressing the problem of the wastes there). This industry will never satisfy the corporate criteria of short term profitability. This was made possible in France because of a strong government, like it or not. The way it was done is debatable, but now belongs to history. No doubt can the US can do the same at their own scale (x5). The question is "will they want to?". I doubt so.
Gen III reactors do not differ from Gen II in the way they use natural Uranium resources. Gen III reactors are simply Gen II made safer by adding new features such as a double containment wall (in case of an aircraft crash) or a corium catcher (in case of core meltdown). In Europe, two Gen III reactors are presently under construction, one in Finland, one in France.

Gen II or III will never replace fossil fuels on a large scale. Uranium is a scarce resource. The Earth's crusts contains 200 years of the current annual Uranium consumption, while the world's reactors provide 6% of the total energy supplies of mankind. In other words Gen II/III and uranium can only supply 12 years of the world's energy requirements. That is much less than fossil fuels with a 100-year potential, the major part of which consists in coal.

To go further with fission, you have to either extract uranium from sea water or move to Gen IV and reprocessing with a closed fuel cycle, possibly using Thorium as an alternate fuel. You may expect to gain a factor of 50 in terms of energy potential which is enormous. Gen IV could be a substitute to fossil fuels but this is a horse of another color because none of the above technologies has ever been proven on a large scale.