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Russia has a couple fast uranium reactors in commercial operation right now. The US probably would too, if the Clinton administration hadn't shut down the Inte
by DennisP 4y ago
Russia has a couple fast uranium reactors in commercial operation right now.
The US probably would too, if the Clinton administration hadn't shut down the Integral Fast Reactor project a couple years before they were done, after thirty years of development.
- Schroedingersat 4y agoCommercial is a long stretch for the BN600. It caught fire constantly and would make even Vogtle look like good value for money. I'd love to be optimistic about the BN800, but as it is currently operated it's more of a demonstration project that also happens to get rid of plutonium and produce some power. As I understand this is due to political proliferation reasons more than technical. Neither actually achieve the orders of magnitude increase in burnup that the FNR concept is supposed to enable. They are about on par with a CANDU in terms of energy produced per kg of fissile material. Hopefully China's program isn't vaporware and they decide to share and the USA lets them be built without triggering an express delivery of democracy. Alternatively batteries/electrolysers will keep getting cheaper and the whole thing will become irrelevant because a red hot pool of molten sodium (or Fluorene and Beryllium salts) isn't a particularly cheap, fun, or safe thing to interact with even without the nuclear issues.