6 ms·

Floating nuclear power plants are very intriguing. You get extremely reliable cooling, decouple from high G earthquake accelerations, and, most importantly, can

Floating nuclear power plants are very intriguing. You get extremely reliable cooling, decouple from high G earthquake accelerations, and, most importantly, can build in a fully serialized shipyard based manufacturing facility, tackling the major cost issues of nuclear in general. The first one the US ran was the MH-1A Sturgis, built out of a converted liberty ship. It powered part of the Panama Canal for a while. [1] The big story, which is nearly forgotten, is that Westinghouse and Newport News jointly developed large floating nuclear plants as Offshore Power Systems. They installed the world's largest gantry crane on Blount Island in Jacksonville, FL at their nuclear reactor mass production gigafactory and got an actual manufacturing license from the NRC to build the first 8 units. [2] I consider this one of the most promising ways to get nuclear power's ducks in a row, enabling it to mass produce reactors at a pace relevant more relevant for a rapid global energy transition. And starting out with a relief ship is a very appropriate way to kick this off again. NPR's Science Friday covered that story back in 2020 [3] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MH-1A https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MH-1A [2] https://whatisnuclear.com/offshore-nuclear-plants.html https://whatisnuclear.com/offshore-nuclear-plants.html [3] https://www.sciencefriday.com/segments/floating-nuclear-power-plants/ https://www.sciencefriday.com/segments/floating-nuclear-powe...

newsclues 3y ago
As a ship designed for disaster recovery they are very interesting, as they can provide power, clean water, food, medical care and basic services for a city, and they can travel rapidly, but only access costal cities.
- acidburnNSA 3y ago
  Exactly. This happens with nuclear-powered military vessels sometimes, like in Haiti 2010 where the USS Carl Vinson rolled up and desalinated 150,000 gallons of seawater per day.[1] [1] https://www.dvidshub.net/image/252518/soldiers-bring-fresh-clean-water-haiti https://www.dvidshub.net/image/252518/soldiers-bring-fresh-c... > One of the great benefits of a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier is that we were able to proceed at 30 knots for two full days to arrive on station,” said Carl Vinson Commanding Officer, Capt. Bruce H. Lindsey. “Our flexibility, speed and sustainability enable us to immediately begin the relief efforts.” — MC1 Jason Thompson, militarynews.com, Jan 21, 2010 [2] [2] https://www.militarynews.com/norfolk-navy-flagship/oceana/news/carl-vinson-begins-humanitarian-operations-in-haiti/article_2a3e4389-eaab-5570-b6c2-31ede28491c9.html https://www.militarynews.com/norfolk-navy-flagship/oceana/ne...
- picadores 3y ago
  40 % of humanity.. https://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/natlinfo/indicators/methodology_sheets/oceans_seas_coasts/pop_coastal_areas.pdf https://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/natlinfo/indicators/methodolo... Not to bad..
jabl 3y ago
While I agree there are some very positive aspects to floating nuclear power plants, I'm somewhat skeptic about some of these plans that use molten salt reactors. A thin-skinned reactor filled with a water-soluble fuel sounds like a potentially nasty accident scenario. At least with a traditional LWR the seawater (hopefully!) has to corrode through some pretty thick metal before it reaches the fuel elements, and even then the fuel is in a relatively inert state (oxide).
- acidburnNSA 3y ago
  Fully agree. LWRs are perfect for floating. Going to some untested/underdeveloped reactor for especially the first one is really dumb. My favorite meme is the Anakin/Padme one where Anakin says he's going to build reactors on ships and Padme asks: "PWRs right?"
- kaiwen1 3y ago
  The reactors will be high temp gas cooled reactors, not molten salt, and use TRISO, which is much safer. [1] [1] https://breakingdefense.com/2020/04/new-triso-nuclear-mini-reactors-will-be-safe-program-manager/ https://breakingdefense.com/2020/04/new-triso-nuclear-mini-r...
mcpackieh 3y ago
It's also possible to repossess a floating power plant, perhaps making it easier for these projects to be financed.
- acidburnNSA 3y ago
  Yes, that's another advantage. If the locale decides they don't want you, or if your PPA expires and you can get a better rate elsewhere, hoist anchor and head on over.
theptip 3y ago
I think the objective benefits of this approach look promising, but my concern is that nuclear isn’t held back by being objectively worse, it’s held back by psychological trauma from the Cold War and general scariness of nuclear in the eyes of the lay public. By that metric, this is worse! “What if it melts down? Then you will pollute our oceans and create mutant fish and make the whole planet uninhabitable!” The public seems really bad at understanding dilution of small amounts of nuclear discharge for example; see Fukushima.
- dale_glass 3y ago
  It is being held back by being objectively worse, that is, expensive and slow to build. If it made money, it could be used to overcome the political problems. Just look at oil. Huge ecological disasters and it still keeps on chugging because it makes lots of $$$ for lots of people.
  - theptip 3y ago
    It’s expensive largely because of regulatory requirements to be 10x safer (in deaths per MWh) than fossil fuels. You’d have to look at less-regulated countries like China to get the “apples to apples” comparison of how much it would cost without crippling regulation.
    - dale_glass 3y ago
      Nobody ever actually explains what requirements would be reasonable to drop and still maintain safety. Because it turns out a whole lot of them are expensive and necessary. Skimp on containment building? You get Chernobyl. Skimp on wall and backup power? Fukushima. Skimp on relief valve? You get TMI, which while overall harmless was still expensive. Thanks to Fukushima it got even more expensive, because now they concluded that backup power must be available quickly in the event of a disaster. Which means the availability of the required parts close enough and the ability to bring them by helicopter, if I recall correctly.
      - 3y ago
TylerE 3y ago
Interesting, I hadn't heard of those. I know a few countries (including the US) tried nuclear-powered civilian ships and they were...not successes. The problem is the viable lifetime of a sea-going hull is very limited, perhaps 25-30 years at the outside. Decommissioning nuclear ships is a BIG problem. Salt is a formidable enemy. There are plans to convert the US attempt (NS Savannah) into a museum ship, but they can't even start on it yet because the hull is still, almost 50 years after the reactor was removed (1976) too radioactive.
- kayodelycaon 3y ago
  Hulls can last a lot longer than 30 years if the hull is maintained. If you keep steel painted, it can last a long time.
ridgeguy 3y ago
They would be decoupled from immediate earthquake effects, but not from subsequent tsunamis. Had there been such a ship moored off the Tohoku region of Japan in 2011, there would have been less than an hour to mitigate damage. Not even enough time to put to sea, let alone shut the reactor down. That might well be as if one of the Fukushima reactors had been uprooted and carried inland.
- p1mrx 3y ago
  "Survive the worst-case tsunami" is an engineering problem with possible solutions. If they can convincingly solve this problem, they'll have a much easier time finding customers.

newsclues 3y ago

As a ship designed for disaster recovery they are very interesting, as they can provide power, clean water, food, medical care and basic services for a city, and they can travel rapidly, but only access costal cities.

acidburnNSA 3y ago
Exactly. This happens with nuclear-powered military vessels sometimes, like in Haiti 2010 where the USS Carl Vinson rolled up and desalinated 150,000 gallons of seawater per day.[1] [1] https://www.dvidshub.net/image/252518/soldiers-bring-fresh-clean-water-haiti https://www.dvidshub.net/image/252518/soldiers-bring-fresh-c... > One of the great benefits of a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier is that we were able to proceed at 30 knots for two full days to arrive on station,” said Carl Vinson Commanding Officer, Capt. Bruce H. Lindsey. “Our flexibility, speed and sustainability enable us to immediately begin the relief efforts.” — MC1 Jason Thompson, militarynews.com, Jan 21, 2010 [2] [2] https://www.militarynews.com/norfolk-navy-flagship/oceana/news/carl-vinson-begins-humanitarian-operations-in-haiti/article_2a3e4389-eaab-5570-b6c2-31ede28491c9.html https://www.militarynews.com/norfolk-navy-flagship/oceana/ne...
picadores 3y ago
40 % of humanity.. https://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/natlinfo/indicators/methodology_sheets/oceans_seas_coasts/pop_coastal_areas.pdf https://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/natlinfo/indicators/methodolo... Not to bad..

jabl 3y ago

While I agree there are some very positive aspects to floating nuclear power plants, I'm somewhat skeptic about some of these plans that use molten salt reactors. A thin-skinned reactor filled with a water-soluble fuel sounds like a potentially nasty accident scenario. At least with a traditional LWR the seawater (hopefully!) has to corrode through some pretty thick metal before it reaches the fuel elements, and even then the fuel is in a relatively inert state (oxide).

acidburnNSA 3y ago
Fully agree. LWRs are perfect for floating. Going to some untested/underdeveloped reactor for especially the first one is really dumb. My favorite meme is the Anakin/Padme one where Anakin says he's going to build reactors on ships and Padme asks: "PWRs right?"
kaiwen1 3y ago
The reactors will be high temp gas cooled reactors, not molten salt, and use TRISO, which is much safer. [1] [1] https://breakingdefense.com/2020/04/new-triso-nuclear-mini-reactors-will-be-safe-program-manager/ https://breakingdefense.com/2020/04/new-triso-nuclear-mini-r...

mcpackieh 3y ago

It's also possible to repossess a floating power plant, perhaps making it easier for these projects to be financed.

acidburnNSA 3y ago
Yes, that's another advantage. If the locale decides they don't want you, or if your PPA expires and you can get a better rate elsewhere, hoist anchor and head on over.

theptip 3y ago

I think the objective benefits of this approach look promising, but my concern is that nuclear isn’t held back by being objectively worse, it’s held back by psychological trauma from the Cold War and general scariness of nuclear in the eyes of the lay public. By that metric, this is worse! “What if it melts down? Then you will pollute our oceans and create mutant fish and make the whole planet uninhabitable!” The public seems really bad at understanding dilution of small amounts of nuclear discharge for example; see Fukushima.

dale_glass 3y ago
It is being held back by being objectively worse, that is, expensive and slow to build. If it made money, it could be used to overcome the political problems. Just look at oil. Huge ecological disasters and it still keeps on chugging because it makes lots of $$$ for lots of people.
- theptip 3y ago
  It’s expensive largely because of regulatory requirements to be 10x safer (in deaths per MWh) than fossil fuels. You’d have to look at less-regulated countries like China to get the “apples to apples” comparison of how much it would cost without crippling regulation.
  - dale_glass 3y ago
    Nobody ever actually explains what requirements would be reasonable to drop and still maintain safety. Because it turns out a whole lot of them are expensive and necessary. Skimp on containment building? You get Chernobyl. Skimp on wall and backup power? Fukushima. Skimp on relief valve? You get TMI, which while overall harmless was still expensive. Thanks to Fukushima it got even more expensive, because now they concluded that backup power must be available quickly in the event of a disaster. Which means the availability of the required parts close enough and the ability to bring them by helicopter, if I recall correctly.
    - 3y ago

TylerE 3y ago

Interesting, I hadn't heard of those. I know a few countries (including the US) tried nuclear-powered civilian ships and they were...not successes. The problem is the viable lifetime of a sea-going hull is very limited, perhaps 25-30 years at the outside. Decommissioning nuclear ships is a BIG problem. Salt is a formidable enemy. There are plans to convert the US attempt (NS Savannah) into a museum ship, but they can't even start on it yet because the hull is still, almost 50 years after the reactor was removed (1976) too radioactive.

kayodelycaon 3y ago
Hulls can last a lot longer than 30 years if the hull is maintained. If you keep steel painted, it can last a long time.

ridgeguy 3y ago

They would be decoupled from immediate earthquake effects, but not from subsequent tsunamis. Had there been such a ship moored off the Tohoku region of Japan in 2011, there would have been less than an hour to mitigate damage. Not even enough time to put to sea, let alone shut the reactor down. That might well be as if one of the Fukushima reactors had been uprooted and carried inland.

p1mrx 3y ago
"Survive the worst-case tsunami" is an engineering problem with possible solutions. If they can convincingly solve this problem, they'll have a much easier time finding customers.