sfreporter.com — Encase it in concrete, truck it to a site, bury it underground, hook it up to a steam turbine and, voila, one would generate enough electricity to power a 25,000-home community for at least five years. The company Hyperion Power Generation was formed last month to develop the nuclear fission reactor at Los Alamos and take it into the private sector
Nov 24, 2007 View in Crawl 4
endersgameNov 25, 2007
I am tempted to call BS too. I think for this to work it would have to be fusion but that technology isn't available yet and they called it fission themselves. I am concerned that they made no mention of what happens to the nuclear waste...
xman2000Nov 25, 2007
Nuclear vessels have hundreds of armed marines to protect them. The article makes it sound like they are going to just bury them in the backyard or something. The only way it would be "safe" is if the fuel was manufactured in such a way that it could not be re-purposed all that easily, such as in so called pebble bed reactors...<a class="user" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_reactor">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_reactor</a>And with every candidate saying Yucca Mountain is a bad idea we need to come up with a strategy for the waste.I personally like the idea of building a bunch of big plants buried deep underground in the middle of nowhere rather than scattering little ones in populated areas.
michnucNov 25, 2007
Not all nations on earth are lucky enough to have that small a population and that amount of natural resources.
michnucNov 25, 2007
Wrong, the most common form of uranium ore is uranite, which is mostly Uranium-dioxide. Largely the issues for "burying it back in the earth" are twofold:1. Current legislation states that Spent Nuclear Fuel (SNF) can only be disposed of in a geologic depository. With this, certain requirements are put on the site that state the dose to individuals so far from the depository must be at certain levels. In order to meet these requirements, engineers construct the waste packages to guarantee (with an amount of error involved), that for X number of years, the waste will likely not leak, and thus not exceed dosages for the time frame of the site license. Thus, if the Uranium is spread over a large volume of material, over thousands of years, the likelihood of leaching is much higher than with an engineered waste package.2. Also, the Uranium is usually one of two oxidation states, U(4) and U(6), which means that these two ions will have different chemical properties. This complicates attempts to create an environment where mobility is completely restricted.
Closed AccountNov 25, 2007
New Zealand only gets about 65% from hydro. Then there's Geothermal for about 10%, Wind 1-2% and Gas/Coal for the rest. Also, damming rivers and flooding valleys isn't entirely "green"Michnuc is right though, with only 4.2 million people in an area larger than England or Japan, we can afford the resources for this type of generation
nighthawkeNov 26, 2007
Two flies to this and one thing to consider with this design. First is hydrogen leakage. There is no known material made by man or nature outside of hydrogen itself that can make a leak-proof hydrogen tank. Second is sustainability. How long will it run before the power curve takes a downturn, and how steep or shallow will it be.Uranium Hydride is highly pyrophobic and can quite literally melt the cell into a lump of radioactive slag if oxygen mixes with the crystals. So it's paramount that the hydrogen "Dewar" is maintained to prevent oxygen from getting into the core. You just don't bury a concrete box into the ground and neglect it. 95% of the areas that it might be used in, the ground is very much active from thermal and geophysical events. Unless the cell is embedded in bedrock it will be subject to those events and may fail. If moisture infiltrates the cell and it contains nitrates or nitrites, it could have the potential of causing explosions. Above ground installations in hermetic enclosures built to exceed local and state building codes is the only practical means to prevent any radioactive contamination from such a event.
doscojonesDec 11, 2007
Engineers that can't spell or write are nearly useless. Grow up and stop making excuses.
doscojonesDec 11, 2007
?Did that having anything to do with anything? No?Didn't think so.
doscojonesDec 11, 2007
Um, wrong. Science is about accuracy. That includes spelling. Real scientist here. Degrees and everything. You lose.
easycheesecakeNov 12, 2008
Oh my gosh I just about died laughing. Thanks for making my day.