DailyDirt: Next-Generation Fission Energy?

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Wed, Sep 30th 2015 5:00pm — Michael Ho

Petroleum prices are relatively low right now, but there are no guarantees that the price of oil will remain low for very long. Progress on biofuels and fusion aren't great bets for the impatient, but there's an existing energy source with some serious growth potential: nuclear fission. Okay, we've been talking about advances in nuclear energy for a while, too, but the barriers are mostly economic/regulatory, not in the engineering or science.

Molten-salt nuclear reactors have been on the cusp of creating a much safer next-generation path for nuclear energy. Molten-salt reactors have passive safety features and can even get rid of some nuclear waste while generating energy. However, cheap petroleum and the high cost of getting a building permit for a new nuclear power plant... have delayed these fission energy developments. [url]
The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) is the only underground nuclear waste repository in the US -- located outside of Carlsbad, New Mexico, in a salt mine. There was an accident involving the "wrong kind" of kitty litter that caused some radioactive material to be released and for the facility to shut down temporarily. Currently, some progress is being made to keep WIPP operational and continue storing long-lived radioactive waste. [url]
A bunch of companies are developing smaller nuclear reactors for commercial use -- generating only a few megawatts or a few dozen megawatts of electricity using reactors about the size of a shipping container (or smaller). It might be easier/cheaper to get these smaller reactors into operation, but the real question is whether or not these designs prove to be significantly safer. [url]

After you've finished checking out those links, take a look at our Daily Deals for cool gadgets and other awesome stuff.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: energy, fission, molten salt reactor, nuclear, nuclear energy, radioactive waste, waste isolation pilot plant, wipp

18 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Sam, 30 Sep 2015 @ 5:36pm

barriers
AFAICT the barriers to nuclear adoption are *not* regulatory. Conventional nuclear power plants are fucking expensive. Is there an estimate of how much of their amortized costs are related to regulatory compliance and/or regulatory risk (e.g. Japan deciding to shut everything down in the wake of a disaster)?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 30 Sep 2015 @ 5:50pm

All that advance physics....
...and all of it to boil water.

Talk about Rube Goldberg.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
dogwitch (profile), 30 Sep 2015 @ 7:06pm

yeap. but i really do hope we get to fusion reactor before i die. another 40 years or so
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Glenn, 30 Sep 2015 @ 7:16pm

Well, we can either keep consuming the planet till there's no livable planet left, or we can implement current and next gen nuclear power. All of our existing plants are several generations back in technology. Our power requirements are not going to decrease... ever. Millions of people already die every year due to fossil fuel burning "tech", yet--of course--the coal, oil, and natural gas industries successfully lobby against new and safe nuclear tech in spite of its safety and efficiency. So, we're dying... but at least it's by our own hand. Good on us!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 30 Sep 2015 @ 8:22pm

Re: All that advance physics....
If I had to choose something for the future, it would be the molten salt reactor with a magneto-hydrodynamic energy extraction method. Basically you use plasma to cool the salt and you run the plasma through a magnetic field to generate power.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 30 Sep 2015 @ 8:43pm

Re: barriers
"Conventional nuclear power plants are fucking expensive."

On the other hand, after their initial construction, they don't consume thousands of tons of coal per day with the associated mining and transportation cost (financial and environmental)... and the cost of storing the resulting ash.

Just saying.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Lawrence D’Oliveiro, 1 Oct 2015 @ 5:59am

Re: ..and all of it to boil water.
It takes a lot of energy to boil water. And even with our “advance [sic] physics”, we’re still not sure why.

That’s why boiling water is such a wonderfully useful way to harness energy.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 1 Oct 2015 @ 6:48am

Considering the driving capabilities of the average person, automobiles powered by fusion is probably not a very good idea. The daily commute is already a challenge with the "accidents" caused by idiots behind the wheel.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Josh in CharlotteNC (profile), 1 Oct 2015 @ 7:15am

Pandora's Promise
If you're interested in this stuff at all, you should watch the documentary Pandora's Promise. It's available on Netflix and other streaming services.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 1 Oct 2015 @ 7:48am

Just want to point out that nuclear waste with the same broadness as household waste or industrial waste. Nuclear waste has some kind of radioactive material in or on it. So the term covers everything including spent nuclear material, the decontamination wipes, used protective equipment, and even the equipment when it's done working.

The kitty litter thing at WIPP is just so much facepalm caused by someone else. Someone thinking they were doing "the right thing" by going green! and not thinking things through and swapping out inorganic absorbent media (clay based kitty litter) for organic absorbent media (wheat based kitty litter). Yep, clay doesn't burn and wheat does, so when absorbing something that gets hot with time which brand do you prefer? That's right. If it doesn't say Gritty Kitty, IT STINKS!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Ninja (profile), 1 Oct 2015 @ 9:05am

Re: barriers
Have you seen the costs to operate such plants? Same for hydro plants, huge installation costs, tiny operational costs.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
JoeCool (profile), 1 Oct 2015 @ 10:27am

Re:
You mean fission. Fusion is PERFECT for powering things that frequently are involved in accidents, because unlike in the movies, when you lose cooling, fusion simply quits; when you lose containment, fusion just quits; if you accidentally feed too much fuel, fusion simply quits; if you breech the core, fusion just quits. It's FREAKING HARD to keep fusion going! Which is good for those times when you don't want it going... like when it's spread across six lanes of freeway after an accident. You also don't have lots of radioactive fuel all over everywhere, which is the problem with fission reactors and vehicles.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
nasch (profile), 1 Oct 2015 @ 2:04pm

Re: Re:
Fusion is PERFECT for powering things that frequently are involved in accidents,

As long as it doesn't involve extremely high temperatures or pressures. But if we had really cheap fusion power it would probably make more sense to use it to extract hydrogen from water and then use that to fuel vehicles. Putting a fusion reactor in a car sounds expensive (Mr. Fusion notwithstanding).
[ link to this | view in thread ]
nasch (profile), 1 Oct 2015 @ 2:05pm

Re:
Who was suggesting nuclear powered cars anyway?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 1 Oct 2015 @ 6:07pm

Re: Re:
Perhaps the following item in the intro paragraph?

"Petroleum prices are relatively low right now, but there are no guarantees that the price of oil will remain low for very long."
[ link to this | view in thread ]
nasch (profile), 1 Oct 2015 @ 8:28pm

Re: Re: Re:
"Petroleum prices are relatively low right now, but there are no guarantees that the price of oil will remain low for very long."

How you got from that to nuclear powered cars I have no idea.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
JoeCool (profile), 1 Oct 2015 @ 9:37pm

Re: Re: Re:
Well, yes, that's very true. If your accident involves temperatures AND pressures approaching that of the center of the sun, fusion may still pose a problem. ;)

And yes, DIRECTLY powering a vehicle via fusion probably won't be for a LONG time (may require room temp superconductors). Much more likely is using fusion power to make electricity to charge battery-powered electric cars, or to split water into hydrogen and oxygen for PERFECTLY CLEAN combustion engines, or fuel cells in electric cars as opposed to batteries.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
JoeCool (profile), 3 Oct 2015 @ 10:15am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
He's just excited about Fallout 4 coming out soon. :)
[ link to this | view in thread ]