Posted on 12/18/2007 9:44:50 PM PST by HAL9000
Actually, Toshiba has been working on this for about a decade. It is a pretty cool idea. It is inheritely safe, due to a sliding neutron reflector used to sustain the chain reaction in the core. The reflector is heat controlled, when it is hot enough, it stops. When it cools, it slides down until it gets hot again. Simple and elegant.
The whole reactor is a cylinder, with 2 pipes coming out of it. One for water in, and one for steam out. There is no need for personnel to run it. Once it is turned on, it stays on until it is exhausted, in 40 years. Security would not be a problem, because you build a bunker with a whopping concrete lid, and slip it in, and drop the lid on. No maintenance, no repairs, and secure. When it is used up, you pull the entire thing out and ship it back.
You would have to have a steam turbine and power generators, along with the afore mentioned building, people, and maintain and repair that, though. I never said that it was a free lunch.
Lithium-6? I thought I remembered reading about that being used to enhance output from nuclear weapons? :-)
The number is debatable, but almost certainly larger than that, especially if you count the cancer deaths, which are still occurring. And it also rendered an area larger than the state of Connecticutt uninhabitable for the foreseeable future. If you are trying to say that Chernobyl wasn't a big deal, that's ridiculous.
“If we do, Achmed has succeeding in dragging us back to the 7th century.”
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for it. We need to do something. The biggest threat I see to small powerplants is the large energy companies. They wouldn’t like it if Joe Blow can buy a reactor and power a neighborhood with it. They would probably buy some politicians and get them to legislate against it.
Good point !
But is is Toshiba.......it’s gonna fail at some point !
Shhhhhhhhhhhhsh !
That’s a damn good mech .... I know exactly how you feel. No major changes since 1989 or so sucks.
BWAH! HA! HA! ..took the words right outta my mouth! Do you remember when the USAF was buying Toshiba laptops back around 1996 or so?...and what JUNK they were?! :-)
It's not going to do much if you seal the reactor in 5 feet of reinforced concrete.
A little nukie never hurt anyone!
The rocket engine test stand is still at the NTS, about halfway between Mercury and Yucca Mtn.
As quoted by Arlington National Cemetary Records:"3 January 1961: A reactor explosion (attributed by a Nuclear Regulatory Commission source to sabotage) at the National Reactor Testing Station in Idaho Falls, Idaho, killed one navy technician and two army technicians, and released radioactivity "largely confined" (words of John A. McCone, Director of the Atomic Energy Commission) to the reactor building. The three men were killed as they moved fuel rods in a "routine" preparation for the reactor start-up. One technician was blown to the ceiling of the containment dome and impaled on a control rod. His body remained there until it was taken down six days later. The men were so heavily exposed to radiation that their hands had to be buried separately with other radioactive waste, and their bodies were interred in lead coffins."
Thank you for reminding us of this pertinent information.
I’m still waiting on Mr.Fusion.
Yep ........crap at it’s best !.....LOL !!
Funny, the Navy has been cruising around for the last 50 years with out drama. The same media morons that are hyping Global Warming once hyped Three Mile Island.
I’d rather live next to this reactor than a neighbor with a Prius.
“The new reactor, which is only 20 feet by 6 feet, “
I want one..
I remember seeing, back in the 1980s, a bumpersticker — in Dearborn — which said, “Thanks Toshiba For Making Russian Subs Run Better”. Thanks for that reminder.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.