On January 28 2012 21:26 enemy2010 wrote: Two words: renewable energies.
I study energy ecomonics, and I personally thing this is the only way.
Would you mind sharing your elaborate thoughts with us? Personally I prefer extreme efficiency over 'renewable' that is even more inefficient than oil, like solar or wind.
Either you build one nuclear plant with a passive safety, or you build hundreds of windmills that will have to be forged out of steel that start off with a pretty big polution, and only after a very long time get any sort of gain out of it. Those windmills take up so much space that forests would have to be cut, houses need to be flattened and you will see so many of them that you basically become green of nausia.
On January 28 2012 21:26 enemy2010 wrote: Two words: renewable energies.
I study energy ecomonics, and I personally thing this is the only way.
Would you mind sharing your elaborate thoughts with us? Personally I prefer extreme efficiency over 'renewable' that is even more inefficient than oil, like solar or wind.
Either you build one nuclear plant with a passive safety, or you build hundreds of windmills that will have to be forged out of steel that start off with a pretty big polution, and only after a very long time get any sort of gain out of it. Those windmills take up so much space that forests would have to be cut, houses need to be flattened and you will see so many of them that you basically become green of nausia.
But I'd like to hear your thoughts on it.
Nuclear fusion is also being worked on and is expected to have a commercial prototype at around 2020-2030 iirc. I really don't get why people pursue renewable energies so much when clean nuclear energy is a much better alternative. There's enough fuel for nuclear fusion to last us millions of years (hint: it's everywhere in the oceans ^_^).
I believe research money is much better spent on research like these clean nuclear fission reactors or even better, nuclear fusion.
On January 28 2012 19:46 CuddlyCuteKitten wrote: After reading up on this it seems that the fuel would be absolutely vile. As in if you get a leak people will die because you need heavy shielding to work with it and it fries electronics so remote manipulation gets harder.
Seems like a decent idea but remember that toxic liquid fuels almost always get replaced with solid fuels because handling and maintnance never work out well. Simply put fluids leak and toxic leaks are bad.
The fuel doesn't fry electronics. If you put the U-233 in storage in a bomb it will fry the electronics of the bomb because it will start to decay and it has a hard gamma emitter in its decay chain. But if you use it as fuel you fission it before it ever has a chance to do this.
Handling and maintenance is actually much harder with solid fuels in a nuclear reactor. This is why we have this spent fuel problem currently in the nuclear industry. Eventually the solid fuel becomes brittle and broken up and we have to take it out of the reactor, and we only use less than 1% of its total energy. If we went over to LFTR and liquid fuels, all the fuel gets used up in the reactor, so handling and maintenance are actually much easier in a LFTR. You need much less shielding and a smaller containment wall with a LFTR because it doesn't operate at high pressure and there is no chance of a meltdown.
On January 28 2012 20:00 white_horse wrote: Cool read, thanks.
It does look like another too good to be true story but if it is really a viable method for nuclear energy, why the hell isn't the US government actively pursing the technology? Because mastering this would basically solve our entire energy problem. That the US government would pass this over and let china go after it alone would mean that we really have total dumbasses heading this country.
The US government did originally develop this technology, at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. But they cancelled the program despite all the promise it showed because, as you said, we have total dumbasses running the country.
On January 28 2012 19:46 CuddlyCuteKitten wrote: After reading up on this it seems that the fuel would be absolutely vile. As in if you get a leak people will die because you need heavy shielding to work with it and it fries electronics so remote manipulation gets harder.
Seems like a decent idea but remember that toxic liquid fuels almost always get replaced with solid fuels because handling and maintnance never work out well. Simply put fluids leak and toxic leaks are bad.
The fuel doesn't fry electronics. If you put the U-233 in storage in a bomb it will fry the electronics of the bomb because it will start to decay and it has a hard gamma emitter in its decay chain. But if you use it as fuel you fission it before it ever has a chance to do this.
Handling and maintenance is actually much harder with solid fuels in a nuclear reactor. This is why we have this spent fuel problem currently in the nuclear industry. Eventually the solid fuel becomes brittle and broken up and we have to take it out of the reactor, and we only use less than 1% of its total energy. If we went over to LFTR and liquid fuels, all the fuel gets used up in the reactor, so handling and maintenance are actually much easier in a LFTR. You need much less shielding and a smaller containment wall with a LFTR because it doesn't operate at high pressure and there is no chance of a meltdown.
Yes but what happens in case of a leak? Meltdown is not the only problem in a nuclear plant. Look at fukushima, no meltdown but still a major operation to fix, mostly inolving humans. But what if there was u232 in the leaked material, how do you fix it then?
Risk is reduced with lower pressure but equipment will fail and I can see it becoming a bitch to fix if the reaction stops and you have unreacted uranium left with hard gamma rays. Just like liquid fuel for icbms, to much of a hazard to maintain and dangerous to reapair if damaged.
On January 28 2012 19:46 CuddlyCuteKitten wrote: After reading up on this it seems that the fuel would be absolutely vile. As in if you get a leak people will die because you need heavy shielding to work with it and it fries electronics so remote manipulation gets harder.
Seems like a decent idea but remember that toxic liquid fuels almost always get replaced with solid fuels because handling and maintnance never work out well. Simply put fluids leak and toxic leaks are bad.
The fuel doesn't fry electronics. If you put the U-233 in storage in a bomb it will fry the electronics of the bomb because it will start to decay and it has a hard gamma emitter in its decay chain. But if you use it as fuel you fission it before it ever has a chance to do this.
Handling and maintenance is actually much harder with solid fuels in a nuclear reactor. This is why we have this spent fuel problem currently in the nuclear industry. Eventually the solid fuel becomes brittle and broken up and we have to take it out of the reactor, and we only use less than 1% of its total energy. If we went over to LFTR and liquid fuels, all the fuel gets used up in the reactor, so handling and maintenance are actually much easier in a LFTR. You need much less shielding and a smaller containment wall with a LFTR because it doesn't operate at high pressure and there is no chance of a meltdown.
Yes but what happens in case of a leak? Meltdown is not the only problem in a nuclear plant. Look at fukushima, no meltdown but still a major operation to fix, mostly inolving humans. But what if there was u232 in the leaked material, how do you fix it then?
Risk is reduced with lower pressure but equipment will fail and I can see it becoming a bitch to fix if the reaction stops and you have unreacted uranium left with hard gamma rays. Just like liquid fuel for icbms, to much of a hazard to maintain and dangerous to reapair if damaged.
If you have a leak it is a problem, you have to shut down the reactor for repairs. However there is no danger to the public, and those of us willing to work in the nuclear power industry accept these risks as part of the job. But again, there is no risk to the public or of environmental contamination, since it is not kept under extreme pressures. There isn't much of a risk of U-232 being in the leaked material, since U-233 is fissioned almost as soon as it is created in a LFTR. But if it ever did happen you would put on a shielding suit, clean it up and put it in a containment barrel.
On January 28 2012 21:26 enemy2010 wrote: Two words: renewable energies.
I study energy ecomonics, and I personally thing this is the only way.
But do you think that for instance due to major technological development in the future, renewable energy sources will be able to supply us with enough juice in scenarios where world energy demand increases exponentially? Is it really economically feasible in the long run? (talking about 50-100 years in the future)
On January 28 2012 21:26 enemy2010 wrote: Two words: renewable energies.
I study energy ecomonics, and I personally thing this is the only way.
But do you think that for instance due to major technological development in the future, renewable energy sources will be able to supply us with enough juice in scenarios where world energy demand increases exponentially? Is it really economically feasible in the long run? (talking about 50-100 years in the future)
You are absolutely right Bartuc they cannot supply us with enough juice. I used to be the biggest fan of solar until I actually crunched the numbers. There is no question there are a ton of applications for solar. Eventually all our cell phones will probably have a solar panel for instance. But those who say it can replace coal, oil, gas and nuclear for grid level generation simply haven't run the numbers. Solar panels, even at 100% efficiency, which we are a long way from, still do not even have the same energy density as coal, and are only slightly better than wood. In most places on Earth the sun provides less than 1500W/sq.m. and that is only for 8 hours a day, so you need a whole other energy generation grid in place for when the sun isnt shining. This just isnt feasible. The only hope for mankind is to move to denser energy sources like fission and fusion, not less dense and less efficient energy sources like wind and solar.
LFTRs and Pebble-bed style reactors have a huge potential to provide safer and cleaner nuclear energy. Considering that even though nuclear technology is fairly safe, there have been some major contamination events in history, and the recent Fukushima disaster has made the idea of nuclear power even more unpopular. It's a hard thing to sell to a group of aging and paranoid 50-70 year olds that retain a stigma towards nuclear topics in general. I hope that in the future these become a more viable option for power but like I said, a lot of people are generally paranoid about nuclear energy in general.
On January 25 2012 10:51 Perdac Curall wrote: matter-antimatter annihilation sometime after that.
How would that even work? Unless you have a supply of antimatter (which we do not), it will take more energy to create the fuel than we get out of it.
It's useful for interstellar propulsion because it has the lowest mass per unit energy output of any fuel, but not as an energy source.
There was a meeting back in 2004 on this very subject detailing the need for a dedicated antiproton facility in the US, but it was ignored by the Bush administration. The amount of energy in matter-antimatter reactions is 1000 times as energy dense as fusion, so it is not implausible that we can achieve a net energy gain there in the future (50-75 years from now when commercial fusion reactors are (hopefully) a reality.)
Yes, the 1000 times as energy dense is what lends it to being such an attractive idea for space travel as it saves so much weight. But it does not suggest that we could achieve a net energy gain. Fact is, because we do not have an antimatter mine anywhere we would have to make it ourselves. And due to the nature of matter-antimatter annihilation the best case scenario is that we get the same amount of energy out as we put in to make it, which isn't such an attractive property for a fuel.
You may be right, but in 50-75 years I hope mankind can prove you wrong.
You mean you hope in 50-75 years we prove the laws of thermodynamics wrong.... that would be really neat, but I'm not going to bet on it.
As for non perpetual motion machines providing long term energy. This sounds promising
Solar would only be useful if it was solar panels in space (they and putting them in space would have to be Much cheaper.. but there is plenty of space there)
Fusion would be more likely as a long term (of course it might be 30 years away for the next 500 years)
Holy shit watching that documentary was completely worth the 2 hours. I can't believe something like this was figured out and not taken advantage of immediately. And I got a pretty good science lesson out of it.
Renewable sources of energy are great and all, but the power being generated is not dependable since it is environmentally dependent. I am convinced that various forms of nuclear are the only way to go for the future.
What is most exciting for me about nuclear is that it has to capability to be used in space. Properly harnessing nuclear power is the path that will allow us to explore the final frontier.
On January 29 2012 09:03 RifleCow wrote: Renewable sources of energy are great and all, but the power being generated is not dependable since it is environmentally dependent. I am convinced that various forms of nuclear are the only way to go for the future.
What is most exciting for me about nuclear is that it has to capability to be used in space. Properly harnessing nuclear power is the path that will allow us to explore the final frontier.
I could not agree with you more. The idea of a manned mission to Mars with fusion powered rockets really gets me excited.
On January 29 2012 08:50 Attican wrote: Holy shit watching that documentary was completely worth the 2 hours. I can't believe something like this was figured out and not taken advantage of immediately. And I got a pretty good science lesson out of it.
It really is good and if you look through Gordon McDowell's youtube page there is a whole bunch more videos he has on there with great talks from some really brilliant people all about Thorium and LFTR. I'm not ashamed to admit I've seen that doc more than 5 times now
On January 25 2012 10:51 Perdac Curall wrote: matter-antimatter annihilation sometime after that.
How would that even work? Unless you have a supply of antimatter (which we do not), it will take more energy to create the fuel than we get out of it.
It's useful for interstellar propulsion because it has the lowest mass per unit energy output of any fuel, but not as an energy source.
There was a meeting back in 2004 on this very subject detailing the need for a dedicated antiproton facility in the US, but it was ignored by the Bush administration. The amount of energy in matter-antimatter reactions is 1000 times as energy dense as fusion, so it is not implausible that we can achieve a net energy gain there in the future (50-75 years from now when commercial fusion reactors are (hopefully) a reality.)
Yes, the 1000 times as energy dense is what lends it to being such an attractive idea for space travel as it saves so much weight. But it does not suggest that we could achieve a net energy gain. Fact is, because we do not have an antimatter mine anywhere we would have to make it ourselves. And due to the nature of matter-antimatter annihilation the best case scenario is that we get the same amount of energy out as we put in to make it, which isn't such an attractive property for a fuel.
You may be right, but in 50-75 years I hope mankind can prove you wrong.
You mean you hope in 50-75 years we prove the laws of thermodynamics wrong.... that would be really neat, but I'm not going to bet on it.
As for non perpetual motion machines providing long term energy. This sounds promising
Solar would only be useful if it was solar panels in space (they and putting them in space would have to be Much cheaper.. but there is plenty of space there)
Fusion would be more likely as a long term (of course it might be 30 years away for the next 500 years)
Kirk Sorensen actually worked on space solar power before getting into LFTR and found it to be completely unfeasible. He gets into a good discussion of it in his ProtoSpace talk at around the 12 minute mark.
What really stands out for me with regards to this technology is the part about being unable to turn the reactor materials into weapons. Will definately ease some tensions in the middle east (if we were using this technology now, tensions would not be mounting with Iran regarding their move to build neculear reactors for power). Likewise for places like North Korea, and countries we just generally do not trust with nuclear materials right now.
Also, it just seems like a way more pragmatic approach to power generation. Really hope this technology comes to fruition.
On January 28 2012 21:26 enemy2010 wrote: Two words: renewable energies.
I study energy ecomonics, and I personally thing this is the only way.
What does that even mean.
No energy source lasts forever. Every star will burn out, every molecule will decay, even black holes will evaporate to hawking radiation in the end. Entrophy reduces all to dust.
But ...
Until that happens I'm quite content for humanity to grab every resource it can get it's hands on to survive and make life easier. Whats not to love about this if it works as intended? Cheap fuel, trivial pollution and huge energy potential.
OP should include disadvantages with the technology as well. The general consensus among the reactor people where I study is that it is highly unsafe since it violates the fundamental defense-in-depth principle. Without the fuel cladding it's somewhat comparable to a PWR with a core meltdown. Because of this reason many consider the technology unrealistic.
Personally I wouldn't mind if more research is performed on molten salt reactors, since it would solve so many problems with generation IV (proliferation is a huge problem with other designs). But I'm not sure if the technology has a future.
If you want to be give a convincing argument, at least link us to a paper or two you've written comparing the costs and benefits of "renewable" energies to alternatives including LFTRs.
EPT
