Current Events — HabitableZone

Current Events » in reply to Breeders

I don't believe that we should take the chance.

Murphy's Law say, "What can go wrong, will go wrong."

The problem with the breeder is not that somebody is going to steal fuel from the operating reactor, but that fuel will be diverted during reprocessing. Fuel must be reprocessed for the breeder to be economical. Only a 10% to 20% burn or so is possible without reprocessing. It is during this reprocessing that fuel becomes vulnerable to theft. In addition, the breeding blanket must be reprocessed to extract plutonium. Another area of vulnerablilty.

Finally, there are scenarios wherein a supercritical reaction in one part of the fast breeder reactor compresses the fuel in the rest of the reactor, resulting in a detonation. Here is how it could happen. A meltdown due to breakup of fuel in part of the reactor could cause the fuel to sink to the bottom and begin an uncontrolled chain reaction, generating enough heat to boil the local socium coolant. This vapor would then compress the remaining fuel. I know that it is supposedly impossible, but the energy is there to be released. The Chernobyl disaster was supposedly impossible too according to nuclear engineers, but it happened anyway. The Enrico Fermi meltdown was not supposed to happen, but it did.

As far as the power output of Sea Solar Power goes, the number of plants does not matter, just the cost per unit power. In that, Sea Solar Power beats nuclear power hands down. In addition, power is routinely sent for large distances. Sea Solar Power plants in the Gulf of Mexico could provide enough power for the entire USA using the EXISTING GRID, once the cables brought the power ashore. In addition, newer designs show that a plant of 500 MWe are practical at 10% the cost of a nuclear reactor, no environmental hazard, no public safety hazard, etc.

Log in or register to post.

The whole thread (23 posts)