Interestingly it seems it's the linear rather than no threshold part of LNT that's unsupported
While there are cases of potential hormesis which would involve a threshold of net benefit, the effect is just too small to get statistical significance
By the same token though, these groups drop a ton of depleted uranium on the linear theory. One radium dial painter cohort recieved 200-1000 mSv without an apparent increase in cancers. You had to go above 1000 mSv lifetime dose for them to see an increase. You need to get about 100 mSv in one day to see an increase due to repair rates
All great points, but you treat Government intervention in the market like you do the physical neutronics issue, as if it were a hard and fast restraint. Dealing with the licensing and spent fuel issues are only made more expensive and slow with government intervention with almost no benefit to safety. The two major constraints are spent fuel and licensing which are only regulatory constraints. Recycling existing spent fuel in fast reactors (breeding/burning) is well understood, as you explained. Getting 30 times the energy out of spent fuel as you did in the original reactor is huge, but completely ignored in discussions. Given the huge market in electricity, free enterprise will solve the problems. Cost is not an object because if it is not solved, it won't sell, if left to free enterprise. You did mention huge barriers to these technologies, yet, you mentioned the large amount of private investment. Ignoring spent fuel (we got this, don't worry), as most of the SMR companies do, is fatal to the public perception of the technology and a critical error, in my estimation. You gave the listener a great synopsis of the issues facing the market for nuclear power and I commend you for that. It is a valuable discussion. Oklo is on the right track, and the recycling (not reprocessing) of spent fuel in fast reactors is a key to opening up the market for all nuclear power and merits a more rigorous discussion than is being offered by SMR companies. I love your point about not detailing the technology. It is another factor in slowing down the entire industry. Until you free yourselves from the Government shackles, which are enhanced by the Government funding, nuclear power will languish as a commodity. I just do not see the benefit of glorifying the Government's huge desire to poison this industry. Note that recycling in fast reactors can produce multi-GW facilities in a very small space while eliminating the need to long-term store spent fuel. Maybe think of delving into that issue as a way to back off the government, which, again, is having little or no effect on safety and a huge effect on crippling nuclear power as a free enterprise product (in concert with massive subsidies for wind and solar). Again, thanks for a great perspective. Worth a listen for all.
This was a great session. I love the history lessons and how today's developers are running into the same issues from the 1950s and 1960s. It reminds me of that saying, "If it was easy everybody would be doing it." A good reminder that with any power production source tradeoffs exist. I came away thinking how important it will be to get High Assay Low Enriched Uranium (HALEU) into production in the US to bring down its costs. I like the idea of calling HALEU, Medium Enriched Uranium (MEU) much better, we should work to adopt that definition.
Also, Nick's suggestion to make the core metrics of the various reactor developers transparent would help investors and engineers. The shielding required around any reactor remains a major costs. I wondered about Copenhagen Atomics with their walls of water for shielding, and the use of thorium as a fuel. It seems the advantages of a thorium reactor addresses a lot of the high bars brought up in this podcast.
It was also a good reminder that ultimately nuclear reactor developers are competing against the stock market and other potential sources for ROI. Including diesel generators.
BTW, I wrote a novel about nuclear energy called, Chain Reaction ( https://tinyurl.com/mvdhrkan ). I had to invent a fictional alloy to get past the shielding problem. It's called Sartorium. I wish it was real. Thank you for an entertaining and informative class.
Nuclear and other electric solutions, i.e. solar, wind, et. al. to the climate/global warming scam solve nothing unless and until the transportation sector gets electricated and the mess and cost of that means NEVER!!
Democratic party of freedom wanted GHE/GHG/CAGW denial/”disinformation” to be a crime (Walz, et. al.).
Real criminals are the bellicose, screeching, fearmongers and their bogus GHE.
Believe = religion
Think = opinion
Know = science
Here’s what I know.
You??
Water vapor, clouds, ice, snow create 30% albedo which makes the Earth cooler not warmer.
W/o GHE there is no water and Earth goes lunarific, a barren rock ball, 400 K lit side, 100 K dark refuting a warming GHE.
“TFK_bams09” GHE heat balance graphic and ubiquitous clones don’t balance plus violate LoT.
Kinetic heat transfer processes of contiguous atmospheric molecules render a surface black body and it’s “extra” upwelling GHE energy impossible.
GHE is bogus and CAGW a scam so alarmists must resort to fear mongering, lies, lawsuits, censorship and violence.
Good to see you on Substack!
Interestingly it seems it's the linear rather than no threshold part of LNT that's unsupported
While there are cases of potential hormesis which would involve a threshold of net benefit, the effect is just too small to get statistical significance
By the same token though, these groups drop a ton of depleted uranium on the linear theory. One radium dial painter cohort recieved 200-1000 mSv without an apparent increase in cancers. You had to go above 1000 mSv lifetime dose for them to see an increase. You need to get about 100 mSv in one day to see an increase due to repair rates
All great points, but you treat Government intervention in the market like you do the physical neutronics issue, as if it were a hard and fast restraint. Dealing with the licensing and spent fuel issues are only made more expensive and slow with government intervention with almost no benefit to safety. The two major constraints are spent fuel and licensing which are only regulatory constraints. Recycling existing spent fuel in fast reactors (breeding/burning) is well understood, as you explained. Getting 30 times the energy out of spent fuel as you did in the original reactor is huge, but completely ignored in discussions. Given the huge market in electricity, free enterprise will solve the problems. Cost is not an object because if it is not solved, it won't sell, if left to free enterprise. You did mention huge barriers to these technologies, yet, you mentioned the large amount of private investment. Ignoring spent fuel (we got this, don't worry), as most of the SMR companies do, is fatal to the public perception of the technology and a critical error, in my estimation. You gave the listener a great synopsis of the issues facing the market for nuclear power and I commend you for that. It is a valuable discussion. Oklo is on the right track, and the recycling (not reprocessing) of spent fuel in fast reactors is a key to opening up the market for all nuclear power and merits a more rigorous discussion than is being offered by SMR companies. I love your point about not detailing the technology. It is another factor in slowing down the entire industry. Until you free yourselves from the Government shackles, which are enhanced by the Government funding, nuclear power will languish as a commodity. I just do not see the benefit of glorifying the Government's huge desire to poison this industry. Note that recycling in fast reactors can produce multi-GW facilities in a very small space while eliminating the need to long-term store spent fuel. Maybe think of delving into that issue as a way to back off the government, which, again, is having little or no effect on safety and a huge effect on crippling nuclear power as a free enterprise product (in concert with massive subsidies for wind and solar). Again, thanks for a great perspective. Worth a listen for all.
This was a great session. I love the history lessons and how today's developers are running into the same issues from the 1950s and 1960s. It reminds me of that saying, "If it was easy everybody would be doing it." A good reminder that with any power production source tradeoffs exist. I came away thinking how important it will be to get High Assay Low Enriched Uranium (HALEU) into production in the US to bring down its costs. I like the idea of calling HALEU, Medium Enriched Uranium (MEU) much better, we should work to adopt that definition.
Also, Nick's suggestion to make the core metrics of the various reactor developers transparent would help investors and engineers. The shielding required around any reactor remains a major costs. I wondered about Copenhagen Atomics with their walls of water for shielding, and the use of thorium as a fuel. It seems the advantages of a thorium reactor addresses a lot of the high bars brought up in this podcast.
It was also a good reminder that ultimately nuclear reactor developers are competing against the stock market and other potential sources for ROI. Including diesel generators.
BTW, I wrote a novel about nuclear energy called, Chain Reaction ( https://tinyurl.com/mvdhrkan ). I had to invent a fictional alloy to get past the shielding problem. It's called Sartorium. I wish it was real. Thank you for an entertaining and informative class.
Nuclear and other electric solutions, i.e. solar, wind, et. al. to the climate/global warming scam solve nothing unless and until the transportation sector gets electricated and the mess and cost of that means NEVER!!
Democratic party of freedom wanted GHE/GHG/CAGW denial/”disinformation” to be a crime (Walz, et. al.).
Real criminals are the bellicose, screeching, fearmongers and their bogus GHE.
Believe = religion
Think = opinion
Know = science
Here’s what I know.
You??
Water vapor, clouds, ice, snow create 30% albedo which makes the Earth cooler not warmer.
W/o GHE there is no water and Earth goes lunarific, a barren rock ball, 400 K lit side, 100 K dark refuting a warming GHE.
“TFK_bams09” GHE heat balance graphic and ubiquitous clones don’t balance plus violate LoT.
Kinetic heat transfer processes of contiguous atmospheric molecules render a surface black body and it’s “extra” upwelling GHE energy impossible.
GHE is bogus and CAGW a scam so alarmists must resort to fear mongering, lies, lawsuits, censorship and violence.