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Uranium/Plutonium reactors are a dead technology. Toshiba lost vast sums of money when Westinghouse Electric went bankrupt recently, mostly for not being able t
by SagelyGuru 10y ago
Uranium/Plutonium reactors are a dead technology. Toshiba lost vast sums of money when Westinghouse Electric went bankrupt recently, mostly for not being able to compete with more economical sources of energy.
That is not to rule out better (safer, simpler) forms of nuclear power, such as Thorium reactors, which is what India is promoting.
Imho, anyone starting a major new nuclear power project today, with the existing Uranium technology, has not done their sums right.
- petre 10y agoNatural Uranium is also okay if used in a reactor with a good track record like the CANDU. The problem is enriched uranium because: - you are basically burning a metal as scarce as platinum (U235) - nuclear proliferation risks India doesn't have much Uranium, has mostly lost access to it because they developed nukes and has abundant Thorium resources. Their Thorium reactor design is based on the Candu PHWR which can run on natural uranium. I wish the Indians the best of luck with their Thorium design, because then they could re-license it to other countries like Japan who's nuclear sectors went bust or are about to.
- hansthehorse 10y agoCommercial reactors are enriched to about 3% plus or minus a bit. Military (naval) reactors are very highly enriched to minimize the size needed. The cost and availability of the uranium has never been the problem. The Carter administration stopped the recovery of the unused uranium in spent fuel thus making the waste problem much worse for the industry. We have decades worth of perfectly good uranium sitting in spent fuel pools all over the country but are unable, by law, to recover it.