7 ms·

Now obviously this would cost a shitload of cash, but could you dispose of it by building a reactor? Said reactor would consume it as the fuel, and so you'd end

by xxpor 4y ago

Now obviously this would cost a shitload of cash, but could you dispose of it by building a reactor? Said reactor would consume it as the fuel, and so you'd end up with fission products instead of plutonium. The costs, security, and the fact that reactors don't use up 100% of their fuel would of course be an issue...

ekr____ 4y ago
OP here. Yes, this seems to be the best available approach. You apparently can burn it in regular reactors if you mix it with uranium in what's called "mixed oxide fuel" (MOX). However, there are a bunch of logistical hiccups that make all of this a giant pain.
- philipkglass 4y ago
  In 2007 the United States started building a MOX facility at Savannah River for turning the old weapons plutonium into power reactor fuel. Its cost and time to completion ballooned far beyond original estimates and it was ultimately canceled. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savannah_River_Site#MOX_Fuel_Fabrication_Facility https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savannah_River_Site#MOX_Fuel_F... "Cost estimate for MOX facility at Savannah River Site swells to $47.5 billion" https://www.augustachronicle.com/story/news/2015/04/22/cost-estimate-mox-facility-savannah-river-site-swells-475-billion/14371088007/ https://www.augustachronicle.com/story/news/2015/04/22/cost-... "US MOX facility contract terminated" https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/US-MOX-facility-contract-terminated https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/US-MOX-facility-cont...
- PaulHoule 4y ago
  The US was planning to burn nuclear weapons plutonium in the Palo Verde plant in Arizona which are a European design designed to use MOX fuel from the very beginning. The hang up is that they were unable to build a MOX fabrication facility in the US even with the help of the French, who have run a successful MOX plant. I haven't seen a detailed explanation of what exactly went wrong, but it seems challenging to build a MOX facility to operate under US worker safety regulation. The trouble is that quality MOX fuel is made with a high energy ball mill that alloys uranium and plutonium oxides by making plutonium particles that are potentially deadly if you inhale them.
  - mrguyorama 4y ago
    Aren't you suggesting that the french have more lax worker protections than the US? I would be very skeptical of that claim. Now, maybe it was """hard""" (expensive) to properly protect your workers and so it didn't make business sense, and that for some reason is enough to kill most good things in the US
    - PaulHoule 4y ago
      They have a different viewpoint. My understanding is that the factory where Karen Silkwood worked at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cimarron_Fuel_Fabrication_Site https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cimarron_Fuel_Fabrication_Site was unable to eliminate plutonium particles completely from the work spaces so that workers had to wear breathing protection 100% of the time at work. It may be the French are OK with this but the US is not. Britain built a MOX facility that was unable to make quality fuel https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/minister-admits-total-failure-of-sellafield-mox-plant-793489.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/minister-admi... The Russians were concerned enough about the primary route to MOX failing that they developed an alternate "vibropacking" route that they didn't need in the end. Russia is now recycling MOX in the BN-800 reactor.
      - MichaelZuo 4y ago
        What's wrong with requiring workers to wear breathing protection 100% of the time? Isn't there hazard pay?
        andrewflnr 4y ago
        Hazard pay is sort of passable for risks like falling off a telephone pole, where you pretty much fully prevent it if you're careful and know for sure whether it happened to you or not. It's not at all compelling (morally anyway) for a risk with much higher odds, where you won't know for twenty years whether it gave you cancer. That's just taking advantage of people's shortsightedness, and I don't think "but I paid them really well" is an excuse.
- Zancarius 4y ago
  There's a small typo around 1/3rd of the way down: It reads "Alomogordo New Mexico." The city should be rendered "Alamogordo." It's also something of a persistent anachronism that lends itself to the historic population centers, I suspect. The actual test location was at Trinity Site, which is closer to present day Socorro and Carrizozo[1] than to Alamogordo and detonated on the north end of what was then called the "Alamogordo Bombing Range." This location is now a part of the broader White Sands Missile Range. It gives me some amusement as a local, because we occasionally hear the question "Oh, Alamogordo? That's where they tested the bomb, isn't it?!" I hate to disappoint their curiosity, of course, but according to present day geography, no; historically—kind of—if you consider everything was then associated with Alamogordo, including the army air base! To us, Trinity Site is 80 miles to the north/northwest and on the other side of the Oscura Mountains (north of the San Andres Mountains)! [1] https://www.google.com/maps/@33.6815401,-106.4737885,20277m/data=!3m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@33.6815401,-106.4737885,20277m/...
  - aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA 4y ago
    The confusion probably arises from the fact that if you want to visit the Trinity Site, the caravan departs from the Alamogordo High School parking lot.
    - Zancarius 4y ago
      I'd bet that's a part of it to be sure!
AtlasBarfed 4y ago
MSR MSR MSR aka LFTR LFTR LFTR see my comment below. Hint: MSRs use 99-100% of fuel.
adql 4y ago
It's mostly political problem of "it's safer to store it in some bunker than to literally ship nuclear bomb material to power plants". At least according to wikipedia there are reactors in US that were built to also take MOX but it's just not done. And process of production/reprocessing also is harder. I'm sure it would be far cheaper to burn it than store otherwise.
- citizenpaul 4y ago
  >safer to store it in some bunker That doesn't even make sense. Nearly all the fuel reactors use is shipped in anyway, only 5% of the US fuel is from the US itself. How is holding tones of weapon making stuff in one convenient location safer than ultimately getting rid of it through burning it up?
  - fluoridation 4y ago
    The stuff that normally gets shipped is not as enriched as weapons-grade fuel. For security concerns, one would not want to ship highly enriched uranium, so repurposing would involve "diluting" it at the storage site prior to shipment.
    - cogman10 4y ago
      To add to this, a nuclear bomb is nothing more than collecting enough weapons grade fuel into one location. Once you have a critical mass, kaboom! Nuclear reactor fuel, on the other hand, even if it is stolen can't do much more than get really hot. It's not possible (without a lot of expensive post processing) to turn regular reactor fuel into a bomb.
      - kennend3 4y ago
        You did not read the article, or understand nuclear weapons at all, correct? " OK, so we just need to collect enough material and presto, we have a bomb. Unfortunately, it's not so simple: Getting enough of the right material is hard. As soon as you start to assemble the material into a critical mass, it starts reacting, and so if you do it wrong, the energy emission will cause it to explosively disassemble, which isn't fun if you're nearby, but produces a much smaller bang than you were looking for (a "fizzle"). " A nuclear bomb is a massively complex adventure in timed explosions to get the "lens" to work. This is after you figure out what size/shape to make the "pit". Depending on the reactor design, regular reactor fuel often contains plutonium which is rather easy to separate because it is chemically different vs other elements in the used fuel waste. Again this is covered in the article.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
rootusrootus 4y ago
Given the difficulty and expense of building a reactor, I wonder if it would be cheaper to just start firing it into outer space. I'm guessing we could engineer a nigh indestructible container capable of surviving rocket malfunctions [without leaking]. How many Falcon 9 launches would it take...
- xxpor 4y ago
  It's the same problem as doing nuclear power in space: if the rocket blows up during the launch, or even fails normally and just falls somewhere, it would be VERY VERY bad.
- rx_tx 4y ago
  Kurzgesagt has a good cute video on the topic (tl;dr you need a lot of Falcon 9s) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us2Z-WC9rao https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us2Z-WC9rao
  - nvader 4y ago
    Tl;Dr you need a backup planet

by xxpor 4y ago

ekr____ 4y ago

OP here. Yes, this seems to be the best available approach. You apparently can burn it in regular reactors if you mix it with uranium in what's called "mixed oxide fuel" (MOX). However, there are a bunch of logistical hiccups that make all of this a giant pain.

philipkglass 4y ago
In 2007 the United States started building a MOX facility at Savannah River for turning the old weapons plutonium into power reactor fuel. Its cost and time to completion ballooned far beyond original estimates and it was ultimately canceled. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savannah_River_Site#MOX_Fuel_Fabrication_Facility https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savannah_River_Site#MOX_Fuel_F... "Cost estimate for MOX facility at Savannah River Site swells to $47.5 billion" https://www.augustachronicle.com/story/news/2015/04/22/cost-estimate-mox-facility-savannah-river-site-swells-475-billion/14371088007/ https://www.augustachronicle.com/story/news/2015/04/22/cost-... "US MOX facility contract terminated" https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/US-MOX-facility-contract-terminated https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/US-MOX-facility-cont...
PaulHoule 4y ago
The US was planning to burn nuclear weapons plutonium in the Palo Verde plant in Arizona which are a European design designed to use MOX fuel from the very beginning. The hang up is that they were unable to build a MOX fabrication facility in the US even with the help of the French, who have run a successful MOX plant. I haven't seen a detailed explanation of what exactly went wrong, but it seems challenging to build a MOX facility to operate under US worker safety regulation. The trouble is that quality MOX fuel is made with a high energy ball mill that alloys uranium and plutonium oxides by making plutonium particles that are potentially deadly if you inhale them.
- mrguyorama 4y ago
  Aren't you suggesting that the french have more lax worker protections than the US? I would be very skeptical of that claim. Now, maybe it was """hard""" (expensive) to properly protect your workers and so it didn't make business sense, and that for some reason is enough to kill most good things in the US
  - PaulHoule 4y ago
    They have a different viewpoint. My understanding is that the factory where Karen Silkwood worked at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cimarron_Fuel_Fabrication_Site https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cimarron_Fuel_Fabrication_Site was unable to eliminate plutonium particles completely from the work spaces so that workers had to wear breathing protection 100% of the time at work. It may be the French are OK with this but the US is not. Britain built a MOX facility that was unable to make quality fuel https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/minister-admits-total-failure-of-sellafield-mox-plant-793489.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/minister-admi... The Russians were concerned enough about the primary route to MOX failing that they developed an alternate "vibropacking" route that they didn't need in the end. Russia is now recycling MOX in the BN-800 reactor.
    - MichaelZuo 4y ago
      What's wrong with requiring workers to wear breathing protection 100% of the time? Isn't there hazard pay?
      - andrewflnr 4y ago
        Hazard pay is sort of passable for risks like falling off a telephone pole, where you pretty much fully prevent it if you're careful and know for sure whether it happened to you or not. It's not at all compelling (morally anyway) for a risk with much higher odds, where you won't know for twenty years whether it gave you cancer. That's just taking advantage of people's shortsightedness, and I don't think "but I paid them really well" is an excuse.
Zancarius 4y ago
There's a small typo around 1/3rd of the way down: It reads "Alomogordo New Mexico." The city should be rendered "Alamogordo." It's also something of a persistent anachronism that lends itself to the historic population centers, I suspect. The actual test location was at Trinity Site, which is closer to present day Socorro and Carrizozo[1] than to Alamogordo and detonated on the north end of what was then called the "Alamogordo Bombing Range." This location is now a part of the broader White Sands Missile Range. It gives me some amusement as a local, because we occasionally hear the question "Oh, Alamogordo? That's where they tested the bomb, isn't it?!" I hate to disappoint their curiosity, of course, but according to present day geography, no; historically—kind of—if you consider everything was then associated with Alamogordo, including the army air base! To us, Trinity Site is 80 miles to the north/northwest and on the other side of the Oscura Mountains (north of the San Andres Mountains)! [1] https://www.google.com/maps/@33.6815401,-106.4737885,20277m/data=!3m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@33.6815401,-106.4737885,20277m/...
- aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA 4y ago
  The confusion probably arises from the fact that if you want to visit the Trinity Site, the caravan departs from the Alamogordo High School parking lot.
  - Zancarius 4y ago
    I'd bet that's a part of it to be sure!

AtlasBarfed 4y ago

MSR MSR MSR aka LFTR LFTR LFTR see my comment below. Hint: MSRs use 99-100% of fuel.

adql 4y ago

It's mostly political problem of "it's safer to store it in some bunker than to literally ship nuclear bomb material to power plants". At least according to wikipedia there are reactors in US that were built to also take MOX but it's just not done. And process of production/reprocessing also is harder. I'm sure it would be far cheaper to burn it than store otherwise.

citizenpaul 4y ago
>safer to store it in some bunker That doesn't even make sense. Nearly all the fuel reactors use is shipped in anyway, only 5% of the US fuel is from the US itself. How is holding tones of weapon making stuff in one convenient location safer than ultimately getting rid of it through burning it up?
- fluoridation 4y ago
  The stuff that normally gets shipped is not as enriched as weapons-grade fuel. For security concerns, one would not want to ship highly enriched uranium, so repurposing would involve "diluting" it at the storage site prior to shipment.
  - cogman10 4y ago
    To add to this, a nuclear bomb is nothing more than collecting enough weapons grade fuel into one location. Once you have a critical mass, kaboom! Nuclear reactor fuel, on the other hand, even if it is stolen can't do much more than get really hot. It's not possible (without a lot of expensive post processing) to turn regular reactor fuel into a bomb.
    - kennend3 4y ago
      You did not read the article, or understand nuclear weapons at all, correct? " OK, so we just need to collect enough material and presto, we have a bomb. Unfortunately, it's not so simple: Getting enough of the right material is hard. As soon as you start to assemble the material into a critical mass, it starts reacting, and so if you do it wrong, the energy emission will cause it to explosively disassemble, which isn't fun if you're nearby, but produces a much smaller bang than you were looking for (a "fizzle"). " A nuclear bomb is a massively complex adventure in timed explosions to get the "lens" to work. This is after you figure out what size/shape to make the "pit". Depending on the reactor design, regular reactor fuel often contains plutonium which is rather easy to separate because it is chemically different vs other elements in the used fuel waste. Again this is covered in the article.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

rootusrootus 4y ago

Given the difficulty and expense of building a reactor, I wonder if it would be cheaper to just start firing it into outer space. I'm guessing we could engineer a nigh indestructible container capable of surviving rocket malfunctions [without leaking]. How many Falcon 9 launches would it take...

xxpor 4y ago
It's the same problem as doing nuclear power in space: if the rocket blows up during the launch, or even fails normally and just falls somewhere, it would be VERY VERY bad.
rx_tx 4y ago
Kurzgesagt has a good cute video on the topic (tl;dr you need a lot of Falcon 9s) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us2Z-WC9rao https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Us2Z-WC9rao
- nvader 4y ago
  Tl;Dr you need a backup planet