'Tree-sized' Nuclear Reactor to power rural Alaska houses, cars

[PeteH]

At what point do you see the space program being reliable enough to send this waste into outer space? It woudl only take 1 accident to have horrible consequences. Now look at the amount of meterial we are talking about. It would require a huge number of launches to make a dent in just the current piles of waste, nevermind any new generation in the years between now and the hypothetical time when it is actually deemed to be a safe process. It is like looking to interstellar travel for solutions to overpopulation. You will never export enough peopel on a vessel to make a dent in the existing population, and if you had people willing to exercise the level of population control necessary for suvival on this hypothetical space ship, you woudl have no need to export population in the first place, people could just control it themselves.

[Dis]

Ahh but in 100 years we may have a space elevator.

Currently we cannot do it. Rocket technology is still too unreliable.

[Kuciwalker]

Still, the energy to lift it out of the gravity well...

Now, solar stations in orbit would be nice, or microwave plants. Though those make me remember Sim City 2000, and how there would be fires near them

[mrmitchell]

but I got out long ago because I knew there was no future for nuclear power in america.

Agreed. Even though it's damn safe for all the electricity it produces, it's such a political hot potato that it will not get off the ground in the foreseeable future. (Even though so many people apparently don't mind the concept of mini-nukes to be used on enemy armies that we're invading )

The article said it could be recyclable...really? Is it efficient to recycle? (The waste, that is)

Looks good on the whole, though. A lot better than that flowing water = power crap.

[Kuciwalker]

I had an idea about how to recycle used nuclear fuel, acutally... don't use rods. Dissolve the uranium in water. The water is compressed (which it is anyway in normal nuclear plants) to keep it from boiling, and transfers its heat to another, unconnected and unpressurized water system which turns into steam and drives a turbine yada yada like a normal plant. When the concentration of uranium diminishes beyond the point necessary for a sustainable reaction, you depressurize the water and it poofs into steam. It then collects in a rim near the top of the tank (basically, you distill the dissolved metals out of it). It should be relatively simple to seperate the uranium from the other elements that result when uranium splits. Add a bit more usable uranium to make up for what was actually used, put the water back in so it dissolves, and start back up.

[Urban Ranger]

How do you dissolve uranium in water?

[MichaeltheGreat]

Originally posted by Combat Ingrid
There seems to be plenty of water in the region. Are the rivers frozen too much of the year or is it too bad for the environment to build hydro plants?

Both, plus hydro plants don't economically scale down that well to do lots of little ones instead of a few large ones.

[Space05us]

damn japanese are trying to sabatoge us, first they come to our state with oversized cameras strung about thier necks, and next they're going to put a remote detonated nuclear bomb in our back yard!??? Not if I have anything to say about it!!!!!




I dont think they would build a nuclear reactor up here, especially that close to ANWR concidering the potential danger.

[axi]

skywalker. I can see a few problems in your idea:

1. Density. Uranium concentration in water would never reach the critical stage, unless a huge body of water were used.

2. Vapour contamination. Solids vaporize too, so during decompression, some of radioactive material would exit the system along with the water vapour.

3. Byproduct separation. During nuclear fission, Uranium nuclei are split into two smaller radioactive nuclei (don't remember the element's names) which, inside a spent rod, are incorporated into the same metal matrix as the original material. These byproducts will probably crystallize in a similar fashion together with Uranium in the residue that is found after the vaporization of the solvent. So your goal of separating spent material will not be achieved. Apart from that, even if you achieve separation (by processing spent rods, as North Korea is doing f.e.), you will still have to dispense of the two fission byproducts in some way.

One good solution to help with the radioactivw waste storage problem is to include radioactive materials as cramatic elements in glass. All heavy metals are good cramatic materials for glass. F.e., the most important ingredient for all high quality crystalware is led. DU specifically is being used in some crystalware processes because it makes crystal fluorescent under UV light. The good thing about inclusion in a glass mass, is that it virtually eliminates the probability of leakage, because glass, unlike pure metals, does not corrode.

[Provost Harrison]

Originally posted by Ramo
Atomic power
Atomic power
Was given by the mighty hand of God

Very nice, but would cause a problem if the bugger blew up

[Wraith]

--""The word 'nuclear' makes me nervous," said Randy Virgin of the Alaska Center for the Environment."

This quote says it all about the problems they'll have putting these into use. Maybe they need to change the name, like they did with MRIs.

--"what I'm most interested in is how the reflector will keep the reactor critical."

By reflecting enough of the particles back in to keep the reaction going of course ^_^ More technical details would be nice, though.

--"The question, as always, is "What do we do with the stuff afterwards?""

Well, if done properly, we could always put it back where it came from. Personally I'd be more worried about the byproducts of coal and oil plants. Arsenic and the like don't have half-lives.

--"why can we not put that energy instead in to changing our way of life so that we do not need the power and eliminate the risk?"

Don't need power? Well, I don't know about you, but living out in the woods in a tent and hunting bears for meat isn't all that attractive an idea.
There are ways to economize on energy usage, of course. Any sensible person is going to do at least some of them, if only because it cuts down on the power bill. Some of them won't save you enough on power to be worth the outlay, of course.

--"especially that close to ANWR concidering the potential danger."

If you mean to some politician's career, I'll agree with you ^_^

Wraith
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate

[Sikander]

We wouldn't necessarily need to use rockets to launch nuclear waste into space. We could use mass drivers that could be much more reliable, as there is no reason to avoid very heavy g forces. The loads could then be picked up in orbit and placed into an even larger (but much more efficient due to the lack of air resistance) mass driver and propelled into the sun.

[Drake Tungsten]

damn japanese are trying to sabatoge us, first they come to our state with oversized cameras strung about thier necks, and next they're going to put a remote detonated nuclear bomb in our back yard!??? Not if I have anything to say about it!!!!!

If you don't want it, just tell Toshiba so. Hopefully they'll install it in Japan instead; God knows this country could use some more sources of power.

[Curiosity]

Sending the waste into space would be no problem, given the political will. There are designs for 9" thick steel containers which could easily withstand the worst-case re-entry and impact without spillage.

And if that's not good enough then we already have the technology (in theory) to render the waste relatively inactive, while generating power on the side.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by axi
1. Density. Uranium concentration in water would never reach the critical stage, unless a huge body of water were used.

A huge body of water will not give you the concentration needed.