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Why is it that, that people always underestimate the technical complexities of thise things. a) military nuclear technology will never see civilian use, claimi

by hef19898 3y ago

Why is it that, that people always underestimate the technical complexities of thise things. a) military nuclear technology will never see civilian use, claiming otherwise is beyond naive and ignorant b) civilian nuclear powered vessels have been tried and deemed uneconomical (no, one specialized cargo ship requiring the power from a nuclear reactor to break through 1.5 m of ice doesn't count...) - so far a grand total of 600 maritime reactors (see point one for the military part) in history have been built globally, 400 or so of which are still in operation, in order to decarbonize global shipping that is close to the number of reactors needed yearly, and not even the military providers have the capacity to build that many (e.g. the Russians built, what, six of those since 2014!) You keep hand-waving all of that away...

Manuel_D 3y ago
Again, we have four different countries that built civilian nuclear powered cargo ships. I don't doubt that designing maritime nuclear power for these ships was challenging. But it has already been done. The technology already does exist. The NS Savannah, Otto Hahn, and the Mutsu all used low enriched uranium in their reactors (as opposed to the highly enriched uranium used in military reactors). That's the main challenge in adapting nuclear power to civilian use, and it's already been solved. By comparison, how many green fuel powered cargo ships have been in operation for over a decade? If hundreds of nuclear powered vessels operated for over half a century is too immature, then green fuel powered ships are even less mature that nuclear maritime propulsion.
- hef19898 3y ago
  You have now idea how ship propulsion systems work, do you?
  - Manuel_D 3y ago
    The reason why I said "green fuel" as opposed to artificial natural gas is because hydrogen and ammonia are also potential examples of green fuel, in addition to artificial hydrocarbons. Again, how many ships have been operated with green fuel? There are LNG powered ships, but none using LMG produced in a carbon free manner. As stated above, producing artificial hydrocarbons remains out of our capabilities. Existing power to gas prototypes are really just converting biomass to methane and that method is limited by biomass availability . There are smaller prototypes for hydrogen powered ships, but nowhere near the size of the NS Savannah and they haven't been operated for nearly as long. And I can find no examples of an ammonia powered ship. Again, how many examples of green fuel powered cargo ships in commercial operation can you give? Not fossil fuel powered ships that can theoretically run off green fuel if we hand wave away the challenge of producing artificial methane. But ships actually using green fuel in the same vein that the NS Savannah actually used civilian nuclear maritime propulsion?
    - hef19898 3y ago
      See, comment like that tell me you have no idea how a ship engine, or engines in general work. The problem to be solved is not the ships propulsion system, what stupidly keep repeating with nuclear reactors, but the source of the fuel for those engines we already have (developing new engines is happening day in day out, and that development will simply optimize for ammonia or hydrogen based fuels). A question which has almost zero to do with the question you so desperately want to have answered as some kind of, what, childish got ya? I get it, you area NS Savannah and nuclear fanboy, reality so simply doesn't agree with you, nor do the relevant industries.
      - Manuel_D 3y ago
        > developing new engines is happening day in day out, and that development will simply optimize for ammonia or hydrogen based fuels. Meanwhile, we already have decades of operational experience with civilian nuclear maritime propulsion. It's objectively more mature technology than green fuel. And for the record, I do indeed know hydrogen powered combustion engines work. Perhaps you're unaware that by virtue of hydrogen's much hotter combustion temperatures, it's hard to avoid producing nitrogen oxides (a greenhouse gas) as a byproduct in hydrogen combustion engines [1]. Hydrogen fuel cells are an alternative, but those have less power to volume ratios and have never been deployed at the scales required for nuclear maritime propulsion. Not only that, containing and plumbing all this liquid hydrogen is a challenge, too. There's more complexity than you think to make a hydrogen engine that doesn't emit greenhouse gases. 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_internal_combustion_engine_vehicle https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_internal_combustion...
        hef19898 3y ago
        You just refuse to get it, don't you? We way more experience eunning everything from gas turbines to ship engines than we have running civilian nuclear powered ships, I hope I don't have to explain how many non-nuclear powered ahip we have, do I? We also have more experience using biogas to be burned in combustion engines and turbines of any sort, as we do creating said biogas. We also way more experience in creating sythetic fuels, and using electrolysis to create hydrogen out of sea water (green hydrogen). Those are all solved problems, and thisbis not my opinion, as opossed to you, but facts confirmed by the very industries involved in ship building and shipping. Really pointless to discuss with ignorant tech illiterates like you.

Manuel_D 3y ago

Again, we have four different countries that built civilian nuclear powered cargo ships. I don't doubt that designing maritime nuclear power for these ships was challenging. But it has already been done. The technology already does exist. The NS Savannah, Otto Hahn, and the Mutsu all used low enriched uranium in their reactors (as opposed to the highly enriched uranium used in military reactors). That's the main challenge in adapting nuclear power to civilian use, and it's already been solved. By comparison, how many green fuel powered cargo ships have been in operation for over a decade? If hundreds of nuclear powered vessels operated for over half a century is too immature, then green fuel powered ships are even less mature that nuclear maritime propulsion.

hef19898 3y ago
You have now idea how ship propulsion systems work, do you?
- Manuel_D 3y ago
  The reason why I said "green fuel" as opposed to artificial natural gas is because hydrogen and ammonia are also potential examples of green fuel, in addition to artificial hydrocarbons. Again, how many ships have been operated with green fuel? There are LNG powered ships, but none using LMG produced in a carbon free manner. As stated above, producing artificial hydrocarbons remains out of our capabilities. Existing power to gas prototypes are really just converting biomass to methane and that method is limited by biomass availability . There are smaller prototypes for hydrogen powered ships, but nowhere near the size of the NS Savannah and they haven't been operated for nearly as long. And I can find no examples of an ammonia powered ship. Again, how many examples of green fuel powered cargo ships in commercial operation can you give? Not fossil fuel powered ships that can theoretically run off green fuel if we hand wave away the challenge of producing artificial methane. But ships actually using green fuel in the same vein that the NS Savannah actually used civilian nuclear maritime propulsion?
  - hef19898 3y ago
    See, comment like that tell me you have no idea how a ship engine, or engines in general work. The problem to be solved is not the ships propulsion system, what stupidly keep repeating with nuclear reactors, but the source of the fuel for those engines we already have (developing new engines is happening day in day out, and that development will simply optimize for ammonia or hydrogen based fuels). A question which has almost zero to do with the question you so desperately want to have answered as some kind of, what, childish got ya? I get it, you area NS Savannah and nuclear fanboy, reality so simply doesn't agree with you, nor do the relevant industries.
    - Manuel_D 3y ago
      > developing new engines is happening day in day out, and that development will simply optimize for ammonia or hydrogen based fuels. Meanwhile, we already have decades of operational experience with civilian nuclear maritime propulsion. It's objectively more mature technology than green fuel. And for the record, I do indeed know hydrogen powered combustion engines work. Perhaps you're unaware that by virtue of hydrogen's much hotter combustion temperatures, it's hard to avoid producing nitrogen oxides (a greenhouse gas) as a byproduct in hydrogen combustion engines [1]. Hydrogen fuel cells are an alternative, but those have less power to volume ratios and have never been deployed at the scales required for nuclear maritime propulsion. Not only that, containing and plumbing all this liquid hydrogen is a challenge, too. There's more complexity than you think to make a hydrogen engine that doesn't emit greenhouse gases. 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_internal_combustion_engine_vehicle https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_internal_combustion...
      - hef19898 3y ago
        You just refuse to get it, don't you? We way more experience eunning everything from gas turbines to ship engines than we have running civilian nuclear powered ships, I hope I don't have to explain how many non-nuclear powered ahip we have, do I? We also have more experience using biogas to be burned in combustion engines and turbines of any sort, as we do creating said biogas. We also way more experience in creating sythetic fuels, and using electrolysis to create hydrogen out of sea water (green hydrogen). Those are all solved problems, and thisbis not my opinion, as opossed to you, but facts confirmed by the very industries involved in ship building and shipping. Really pointless to discuss with ignorant tech illiterates like you.