4 ms·

Naval reactors are tiny, inefficient, use high emriched uranium, and are ludicrously expensive even compared to Vogtle. Being slightly more honest about costs

Naval reactors are tiny, inefficient, use high emriched uranium, and are ludicrously expensive even compared to Vogtle. Being slightly more honest about costs and timelines isn't a great sale point. If this fairy tale were true, then the Chinese program would be accelerating rather than failing to meet targets, and the admitted costs would be going down instead of up. Civilian nuclear reactors are for keeping fresh plutonium on hand and making countries without enrichment dependent. Once they are doing that the military support dries up and programs stop expanding.

credit_guy 4y ago
> Naval reactors are tiny, inefficient, use high enriched uranium. Tiny? Virginia-class submarines use an S9G reactor [1], which produces 210 MW thermal, very close to NuScale's SMR (250 MW thermal). Inefficient? Take the A1B reactor that powers the Gerald Ford carrier. It has a thermal capacity of 700 MW thermal. Out of that it sends 260 MWt straight to the propellers, and it also produces 125 MW of electricity (from the remaining 440 MWt). That's an efficiency of 28.4%, which is below the 32-34% of commercial nuclear reactors, but not by that much. Uses highly enriched uranium. That's the case of the American reactors, so the reactor either is not refueled at all during the lifetime of the vessel, or it's refueled only once. French naval nuclear reactors use 7% uranium, which is only slightly richer than the uranium used in civilian reactors (that can go as high as 5%). > and are ludicrously expensive even compared to Vogtle. Incorrect. Production costs of naval reactors are classified, but you can use this CBO report [2] for an educated guess: The Navy would use one of the twin A1B reactors that will power the new Ford class (CVN-78) of nuclear aircraft carriers to power the LH(X) amphibious assault ships [...] Thus, CBO estimated that the acquisition-cost premium [...] would be about [...] $0.9 billion per LH(X). The A1B generates 125 MWe out of 440 MWt. If it were to convert all its 700 MWt to electricity, it would be 200 MWe. That would cost, according to the CBO report about $0.9 billion (actually somewhat less, since this is the difference between the "acquisition cost premium" i.e. the difference between the nuclear reactor and the conventional gas turbine). So that translates into $4.5 BN per GWe. Vogtle 3 and 4 by comparison cost $28 BN for about 2.5 GWe, or $11.2 BN per 1 GWe, which is two and a half time more than the $4.5 BN per GW of the naval reactor. >Chinese program would be accelerating rather than failing to meet targets The Chinese program is accelerating. See for example [4]: It was reported in November 2021 that China planned to build 150 new reactors at a cost of $440bn (2.8trn yuan), which is more reactors than the rest of the world has built over the past 35 years. > Civilian nuclear reactors are for keeping fresh plutonium on hand and making countries without enrichment dependent. Once they are doing that the military support dries up and programs stop expanding. Absolutely not true. There are many more countries operating nuclear reactors than countries that have nuclear weapons. In Europe alone there are 11 countries other than France or the UK that generate more than 25% of their electricity using nuclear power plants [5]. None of these countries have nuclear weapons or secret plans to acquire nuclear weapons. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S9G_reactor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S9G_reactor [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A1B_reactor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A1B_reactor [3] https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/112th-congress-2011-2012/reports/05-12-nuclearpropulsion.pdf https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/112th-congress-2011-... [4] https://www.energymonitor.ai/sectors/power/weekly-data-chinas-nuclear-pipeline-as-big-as-the-rest-of-the-worlds-combined/ https://www.energymonitor.ai/sectors/power/weekly-data-china... [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_by_country
- Schroedingersat 4y ago
  Love the sleight of hand. Pretend breeding ratios don't exist, a vague estimate of the additional cost with output reference of a capability the reactor doesn't even have (with no mention of running costs or cost of money not applying to that finance model), pretending exported russian reactors aren't there to make countries dependent on rosatom (how are those sanctions going?), and pretending china's planned reactor fleet is all going to get built when they're already 20GW behind target and that their costs aren't increasing when they were promised a decrease. So in short a bunch of irrelevant facts that you pretended were a rebuttal.
  - credit_guy 4y ago
    > that you pretended were a rebuttal Maybe you are new around here, but that”s not how we exchage ideas on HN.
    - Schroedingersat 4y ago
      Well nuclear stans do what you did consistently, but actual exchange of ideas entails honestly responding rather than saying something unrelated but on a similar subject and pretending it is a response or carefully answering half of a sentence with something covered by the other half.
      - credit_guy 4y ago
        > honestly responding rather than saying something unrelated Unrelated? I responded to your claims, point by point. You said "tiny, inefficient and use highly enriched uranium", more expensive than Vogtle, China slowing down their nuclear program, and civilian reactors being used for breedign Plutonium, after which they fizzle out. I dedicated a paragraph to each of these. Feel free and re-read my response, and try to link each paragraph with your corresponding claim. Also, feel free to familiarize yourself with this site's guidelines. The link is at the bottom of the screen to the left of the FAQ link, but here it is for your convenience: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

credit_guy 4y ago

> Naval reactors are tiny, inefficient, use high enriched uranium. Tiny? Virginia-class submarines use an S9G reactor [1], which produces 210 MW thermal, very close to NuScale's SMR (250 MW thermal). Inefficient? Take the A1B reactor that powers the Gerald Ford carrier. It has a thermal capacity of 700 MW thermal. Out of that it sends 260 MWt straight to the propellers, and it also produces 125 MW of electricity (from the remaining 440 MWt). That's an efficiency of 28.4%, which is below the 32-34% of commercial nuclear reactors, but not by that much. Uses highly enriched uranium. That's the case of the American reactors, so the reactor either is not refueled at all during the lifetime of the vessel, or it's refueled only once. French naval nuclear reactors use 7% uranium, which is only slightly richer than the uranium used in civilian reactors (that can go as high as 5%). > and are ludicrously expensive even compared to Vogtle. Incorrect. Production costs of naval reactors are classified, but you can use this CBO report [2] for an educated guess: The Navy would use one of the twin A1B reactors that will power the new Ford class (CVN-78) of nuclear aircraft carriers to power the LH(X) amphibious assault ships [...] Thus, CBO estimated that the acquisition-cost premium [...] would be about [...] $0.9 billion per LH(X). The A1B generates 125 MWe out of 440 MWt. If it were to convert all its 700 MWt to electricity, it would be 200 MWe. That would cost, according to the CBO report about $0.9 billion (actually somewhat less, since this is the difference between the "acquisition cost premium" i.e. the difference between the nuclear reactor and the conventional gas turbine). So that translates into $4.5 BN per GWe. Vogtle 3 and 4 by comparison cost $28 BN for about 2.5 GWe, or $11.2 BN per 1 GWe, which is two and a half time more than the $4.5 BN per GW of the naval reactor. >Chinese program would be accelerating rather than failing to meet targets The Chinese program is accelerating. See for example [4]: It was reported in November 2021 that China planned to build 150 new reactors at a cost of $440bn (2.8trn yuan), which is more reactors than the rest of the world has built over the past 35 years. > Civilian nuclear reactors are for keeping fresh plutonium on hand and making countries without enrichment dependent. Once they are doing that the military support dries up and programs stop expanding. Absolutely not true. There are many more countries operating nuclear reactors than countries that have nuclear weapons. In Europe alone there are 11 countries other than France or the UK that generate more than 25% of their electricity using nuclear power plants [5]. None of these countries have nuclear weapons or secret plans to acquire nuclear weapons. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S9G_reactor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S9G_reactor [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A1B_reactor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A1B_reactor [3] https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/112th-congress-2011-2012/reports/05-12-nuclearpropulsion.pdf https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/112th-congress-2011-... [4] https://www.energymonitor.ai/sectors/power/weekly-data-chinas-nuclear-pipeline-as-big-as-the-rest-of-the-worlds-combined/ https://www.energymonitor.ai/sectors/power/weekly-data-china... [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_by_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_by_country

Schroedingersat 4y ago
Love the sleight of hand. Pretend breeding ratios don't exist, a vague estimate of the additional cost with output reference of a capability the reactor doesn't even have (with no mention of running costs or cost of money not applying to that finance model), pretending exported russian reactors aren't there to make countries dependent on rosatom (how are those sanctions going?), and pretending china's planned reactor fleet is all going to get built when they're already 20GW behind target and that their costs aren't increasing when they were promised a decrease. So in short a bunch of irrelevant facts that you pretended were a rebuttal.
- credit_guy 4y ago
  > that you pretended were a rebuttal Maybe you are new around here, but that”s not how we exchage ideas on HN.
  - Schroedingersat 4y ago
    Well nuclear stans do what you did consistently, but actual exchange of ideas entails honestly responding rather than saying something unrelated but on a similar subject and pretending it is a response or carefully answering half of a sentence with something covered by the other half.
    - credit_guy 4y ago
      > honestly responding rather than saying something unrelated Unrelated? I responded to your claims, point by point. You said "tiny, inefficient and use highly enriched uranium", more expensive than Vogtle, China slowing down their nuclear program, and civilian reactors being used for breedign Plutonium, after which they fizzle out. I dedicated a paragraph to each of these. Feel free and re-read my response, and try to link each paragraph with your corresponding claim. Also, feel free to familiarize yourself with this site's guidelines. The link is at the bottom of the screen to the left of the FAQ link, but here it is for your convenience: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html