7 ms·

Curious how this new design addresses the biggest safety challenge of nuclear reactors (the issue that was the root cause of the Fukushima accident and an indir

by gip 9mo ago

Curious how this new design addresses the biggest safety challenge of nuclear reactors (the issue that was the root cause of the Fukushima accident and an indirect cause of Chernobyl): how do we ensure that the nuclear core temperature remains controlled during exceptional events (e.g., earthquakes, structural failures) when the reactor must shut down abruptly?

boringg 9mo ago
Chernobyl and Fukushima were different accidents and causes. Chernobyl was a systemic failure of the soviet system. Fukushima was a wild edge case that an earthquake and tsunami drained the coolant.
- littlecranky67 9mo ago
  Edge cases don't count? The truth is, all reactors ever built were considered safe at their time with whatever definition of safe. No one builds unsafe reactors. Yet they turned out not to be safe.
  - ethmarks 9mo ago
    Nothing is ever perfectly safe and a lack of perfect absolute safety is not a valid objection. All sources of power have associated risks, even renewables. Wind power has 0.04 deaths per terawatt hour and solar has 0.02 [1]. Nuclear power has 0.03 deaths per terawatt hour (safer than wind), and it's worth noting that almost all of those are from Chernobyl, which was considered unsafe even at the time (they knew about the positive void coefficient). I'm not arguing that nuclear power is perfect, mainly because it isn't. But it's not like all other sources of power are idyllic havens of safety. There are always tradeoffs. [1]: https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy
    - TheOtherHobbes 9mo ago
      Those figures seem very optimistic. Uranium miners die early, often of horrific cancers. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33232447/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33232447/ But the bottom line is that renewable costs are trending down, hard and fast, battery tech is just getting started, and development time for wind and solar is comparatively fast. Future nuke costs at this point are speculative, development time is very slow, and even if new reactors were commissioned tomorrow, by the time they came online it's very, very likely solar and wind + storage would make them uneconomic. IMO the attachment to nukes is completely irrational. There are obvious economic downsides, no obvious economic benefits - and that's just the money side.
      - ethmarks 9mo ago
        Thanks for the reply! I think you're arguing with the wrong person in the second half, though. I agree that renewables could potentially be more economically viable than nuclear power[1]. My reply was disputing the "people can die from nuclear therefore we should never use nuclear" argument, not arguing about economic viability. Also I think that broadly claiming that your opposition is "completely irrational" is not a very tactical rhetorical move. [1]: although since you're basing your claims on the speculative future state of solar technology 10 years in the future, I don't see why the same shouldn't apply to the speculative future state of nuclear power, but that's besides the point
      - boringg 9mo ago
        Again I don't know why people do this framing that its either renewables or nuclear. We can and should develop and have both - they provide different energy products to the grid. Solar and storage ARE NOT viable at scale for 99.99% uptime requirements or industrial facilities that are in remote locations. Nuclear is up against against nat gas, diesel or coal (in the rare states that still have coal power plants) for the most part for "baseload" or "firm" power. Nuclear is by far the most advanced technology that we have ever developped on the planet at this point. Fusion is just 10 years away (every ten years) ;)
    - jfengel 9mo ago
      What mechanism causes solar power deaths?
      - ethmarks 9mo ago
        Accidents, mainly. Solar panels and wind turbines produce far less energy per module than nuclear, so you have to build much more of them. If you build enough of something, the odds that everything goes perfect every single time are quite low.
        boringg 9mo ago
        Ill wager a lot of deaths are accidental electrocutions from faulty wires.
      - qiqitori 9mo ago
        Apart from the deaths from workers falling off the roof or from wind turbine towers (though these might be the only type of deaths included in these figures): If mining deaths are included, coal, oil, gas and uranium probably do not look favorable at all, but renewables aren't perfectly safe either: there was a bridge collapse at a copper/cobalt mine in Congo two months ago that killed 32. Solar and wind use more copper per energy unit than other technologies, and solar and wind indirectly require battery technology. Lithium batteries contain lithium and cobalt. (Lithium mining seems relative safe, but 70% of cobalt is mined in Congo, which is known for artisanal mining, and the above-mentioned accident indeed seemed to happen at such a mine.) Wind, especially off-shore wind uses more concrete and steel than other power generation technologies (hydro seems like it'd use a lot too?), which could be explored too. (Course, these metals are recyclable, so you only mine them once.) Battery factories also produce deaths sometimes, e.g. recently https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hwaseong_battery_factory_fire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hwaseong_battery_factory_fire, and batteries in operation as well as discarded batteries sometimes produce deaths too.
  - JumpCrisscross 9mo ago
    > Edge cases don't count? Constrained edge cases are fine. Particularly when contrasted with coal and natural gas, which are, in practice, what everyone is competing against in America.
  - uluyol 9mo ago
    They count as a different type of failure. We knew what to do but screwed up hard is a operational failure and we didn't plan for it is a design/planning failure. The people who are hurt might not care, but understanding the root cause is important to address them.
- Forgeties79 9mo ago
  Let’s not forget that you don’t have to be a socialist/communist nation to decide you want to do the cheaper thing. Without robust regulations I guarantee you a Chernobyl-like disaster could easily happen in the US because of less scrupulous companies cutting corners and choosing the cheaper path. With Chernobyl it was the government instead of a private company. We can talk all day about how the system incentivized people playing CYA rather than actually trying to solve the problem (true and fair critiques), but when it comes down to it, this happened because the cheaper option was chosen and potential issues were overlooked. That transcends political systems.
  - boringg 9mo ago
    I personally find highly hypothetical situations impossible to guarantee but I'm glad you have such a high degree of self certainty for a plausible scenario you have decided to give certain results to. You should really consider educating yourself on the Chernobyl reactor melt down (read a book or two) to understand the level of calamity inflicted by the communist system. Stop trying to make it sound like that could happen anywhere because the pressures of capitalism could cause the same results. Its pretty eye opening how insane the chernobyl situation was.
    - Forgeties79 9mo ago
      I am actually very familiar with the history of Chernobyl and the meltdown. What I’m saying is human greed and short sightedness do not suddenly go away because a nation decides on a different political/economic system. The implication that it only happened because it was the Soviet Union is what I’m taking issue with because it absolutely could happen in the US without proper guardrails. All it takes is one bad company cutting the wrong corner or firing the one person who spoke out. It’s very easy to see no society is immune to this. I am not defending the Soviet Union or any of the decisions made during Chernobyl. So you should redirect your indignation/condescension.
      - boringg 9mo ago
        The differences between soviet state and Us market based capitalism are completely different. Chernobyl didn't fail because of a simple case of human greed and short sightedness. You really haven't read the details of how Chernobyl came about - its truly wild. While I don't disagree that there is always a risk (albeit very small) that the bean counters come in while the regulators are sleeping and risk the actual product (see: Boeing) - to try and put in a fear that the Chernobyl situation is just as possible you are reaching there. Your underlying argument is that we shouldn't use high tech energy and enjoy its benefits because there's a chance somewhere that someone might abuse it but also, that might not happen. Its a blanket safety argument - don't do anything because theres risk.
- consumer451 9mo ago
  The edge case was predicted, but market and political forces chose to ignore it. The GE Type II reactor had known issues. [0] I should add that I am not strictly anti-nuclear, and it is super interesting that some of the largest funders of anti-nuclear propaganda have been actors from the fossil fuel industry. [1] [0] https://publicintegrity.org/environment/reactors-at-heart-of-japanese-nuclear-crisis-raised-concerns-as-early-as-1972-memos-show/ https://publicintegrity.org/environment/reactors-at-heart-of... [1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/kensilverstein/2016/07/13/are-fossil-fuel-interests-bankrolling-the-anti-nuclear-energy-movement/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/kensilverstein/2016/07/13/are-f...
  - boringg 9mo ago
    One of the major reasons thats we have a climate crisis is that we knee capped Nuclear in the 80s and prevent new reactors and new technology development for 40 years. That left the only providers able to fill the gap were fossil based (oil, coal and gas) - which pumped out significant CO2. Not surprised at all that oil and gas is still trying to protect themselves from competition.
- jltsiren 9mo ago
  Wild edge cases are to be expected when you do things at scale. If you build 20 buildings in different regions, at least one of them will likely face a once-in-1000-years natural disaster. And it's difficult to estimate how bad that particular kind of once-in-1000-years event can be, because you probably only have a century or two of reliable data.
Moldoteck 9mo ago
You don't need to prevent it. You just need to prevent a catastrophe and even Fukushima did it relatively well - nobody died or will die from radiation. Current benchmark for (future) gen4 designs is having consequences limited to the area of the plant, think of 3MI but as worst case. But imo it's still an overkill, nuclear is one of the safest sources in terms of human deaths/kwh and the stat only gets better with gen3/3+
- lostlogin 9mo ago
  > You just need to prevent a catastrophe and even Fukushima did it relatively well - nobody died or will die from radiation. “As of 2020, the total number of cancer and leukemia instances has risen to six cases according to the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO).[5] In 2018 one worker died from lung cancer as a result from radiation exposure.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_nuclear_accident_casualties https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_nuclear_accident_cas... These are small numbers compared to the number that died due to the tsunami and the massive evacuation (to avoid radiation injuries). The frustrating bit is that they could have avoided it all.
  - chickenbig 9mo ago
    The linked to article makes a different claim " The workers' compensation claims that have been recognized by labor authorities include six cases of workers who developed cancer or leukemia due to radiation exposure " So compensation has been requested for cancers, of which one death has been reported. I point to a Forbes opinion piece from a pro-nuclear person https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2018/09/06/no-the-cancer-death-was-probably-not-from-fukushima/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2018/09/06/no-the-ca... .
    - lostlogin 9mo ago
      Were you trying to reply to the parent? That’s more or less what I said.
      - 9mo ago

by gip 9mo ago

boringg 9mo ago

Chernobyl and Fukushima were different accidents and causes. Chernobyl was a systemic failure of the soviet system. Fukushima was a wild edge case that an earthquake and tsunami drained the coolant.

littlecranky67 9mo ago
Edge cases don't count? The truth is, all reactors ever built were considered safe at their time with whatever definition of safe. No one builds unsafe reactors. Yet they turned out not to be safe.
- ethmarks 9mo ago
  Nothing is ever perfectly safe and a lack of perfect absolute safety is not a valid objection. All sources of power have associated risks, even renewables. Wind power has 0.04 deaths per terawatt hour and solar has 0.02 [1]. Nuclear power has 0.03 deaths per terawatt hour (safer than wind), and it's worth noting that almost all of those are from Chernobyl, which was considered unsafe even at the time (they knew about the positive void coefficient). I'm not arguing that nuclear power is perfect, mainly because it isn't. But it's not like all other sources of power are idyllic havens of safety. There are always tradeoffs. [1]: https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy
  - TheOtherHobbes 9mo ago
    Those figures seem very optimistic. Uranium miners die early, often of horrific cancers. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33232447/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33232447/ But the bottom line is that renewable costs are trending down, hard and fast, battery tech is just getting started, and development time for wind and solar is comparatively fast. Future nuke costs at this point are speculative, development time is very slow, and even if new reactors were commissioned tomorrow, by the time they came online it's very, very likely solar and wind + storage would make them uneconomic. IMO the attachment to nukes is completely irrational. There are obvious economic downsides, no obvious economic benefits - and that's just the money side.
    - ethmarks 9mo ago
      Thanks for the reply! I think you're arguing with the wrong person in the second half, though. I agree that renewables could potentially be more economically viable than nuclear power[1]. My reply was disputing the "people can die from nuclear therefore we should never use nuclear" argument, not arguing about economic viability. Also I think that broadly claiming that your opposition is "completely irrational" is not a very tactical rhetorical move. [1]: although since you're basing your claims on the speculative future state of solar technology 10 years in the future, I don't see why the same shouldn't apply to the speculative future state of nuclear power, but that's besides the point
    - boringg 9mo ago
      Again I don't know why people do this framing that its either renewables or nuclear. We can and should develop and have both - they provide different energy products to the grid. Solar and storage ARE NOT viable at scale for 99.99% uptime requirements or industrial facilities that are in remote locations. Nuclear is up against against nat gas, diesel or coal (in the rare states that still have coal power plants) for the most part for "baseload" or "firm" power. Nuclear is by far the most advanced technology that we have ever developped on the planet at this point. Fusion is just 10 years away (every ten years) ;)
  - jfengel 9mo ago
    What mechanism causes solar power deaths?
    - ethmarks 9mo ago
      Accidents, mainly. Solar panels and wind turbines produce far less energy per module than nuclear, so you have to build much more of them. If you build enough of something, the odds that everything goes perfect every single time are quite low.
      - boringg 9mo ago
        Ill wager a lot of deaths are accidental electrocutions from faulty wires.
    - qiqitori 9mo ago
      Apart from the deaths from workers falling off the roof or from wind turbine towers (though these might be the only type of deaths included in these figures): If mining deaths are included, coal, oil, gas and uranium probably do not look favorable at all, but renewables aren't perfectly safe either: there was a bridge collapse at a copper/cobalt mine in Congo two months ago that killed 32. Solar and wind use more copper per energy unit than other technologies, and solar and wind indirectly require battery technology. Lithium batteries contain lithium and cobalt. (Lithium mining seems relative safe, but 70% of cobalt is mined in Congo, which is known for artisanal mining, and the above-mentioned accident indeed seemed to happen at such a mine.) Wind, especially off-shore wind uses more concrete and steel than other power generation technologies (hydro seems like it'd use a lot too?), which could be explored too. (Course, these metals are recyclable, so you only mine them once.) Battery factories also produce deaths sometimes, e.g. recently https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hwaseong_battery_factory_fire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hwaseong_battery_factory_fire, and batteries in operation as well as discarded batteries sometimes produce deaths too.
- JumpCrisscross 9mo ago
  > Edge cases don't count? Constrained edge cases are fine. Particularly when contrasted with coal and natural gas, which are, in practice, what everyone is competing against in America.
- uluyol 9mo ago
  They count as a different type of failure. We knew what to do but screwed up hard is a operational failure and we didn't plan for it is a design/planning failure. The people who are hurt might not care, but understanding the root cause is important to address them.
Forgeties79 9mo ago
Let’s not forget that you don’t have to be a socialist/communist nation to decide you want to do the cheaper thing. Without robust regulations I guarantee you a Chernobyl-like disaster could easily happen in the US because of less scrupulous companies cutting corners and choosing the cheaper path. With Chernobyl it was the government instead of a private company. We can talk all day about how the system incentivized people playing CYA rather than actually trying to solve the problem (true and fair critiques), but when it comes down to it, this happened because the cheaper option was chosen and potential issues were overlooked. That transcends political systems.
- boringg 9mo ago
  I personally find highly hypothetical situations impossible to guarantee but I'm glad you have such a high degree of self certainty for a plausible scenario you have decided to give certain results to. You should really consider educating yourself on the Chernobyl reactor melt down (read a book or two) to understand the level of calamity inflicted by the communist system. Stop trying to make it sound like that could happen anywhere because the pressures of capitalism could cause the same results. Its pretty eye opening how insane the chernobyl situation was.
  - Forgeties79 9mo ago
    I am actually very familiar with the history of Chernobyl and the meltdown. What I’m saying is human greed and short sightedness do not suddenly go away because a nation decides on a different political/economic system. The implication that it only happened because it was the Soviet Union is what I’m taking issue with because it absolutely could happen in the US without proper guardrails. All it takes is one bad company cutting the wrong corner or firing the one person who spoke out. It’s very easy to see no society is immune to this. I am not defending the Soviet Union or any of the decisions made during Chernobyl. So you should redirect your indignation/condescension.
    - boringg 9mo ago
      The differences between soviet state and Us market based capitalism are completely different. Chernobyl didn't fail because of a simple case of human greed and short sightedness. You really haven't read the details of how Chernobyl came about - its truly wild. While I don't disagree that there is always a risk (albeit very small) that the bean counters come in while the regulators are sleeping and risk the actual product (see: Boeing) - to try and put in a fear that the Chernobyl situation is just as possible you are reaching there. Your underlying argument is that we shouldn't use high tech energy and enjoy its benefits because there's a chance somewhere that someone might abuse it but also, that might not happen. Its a blanket safety argument - don't do anything because theres risk.
consumer451 9mo ago
The edge case was predicted, but market and political forces chose to ignore it. The GE Type II reactor had known issues. [0] I should add that I am not strictly anti-nuclear, and it is super interesting that some of the largest funders of anti-nuclear propaganda have been actors from the fossil fuel industry. [1] [0] https://publicintegrity.org/environment/reactors-at-heart-of-japanese-nuclear-crisis-raised-concerns-as-early-as-1972-memos-show/ https://publicintegrity.org/environment/reactors-at-heart-of... [1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/kensilverstein/2016/07/13/are-fossil-fuel-interests-bankrolling-the-anti-nuclear-energy-movement/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/kensilverstein/2016/07/13/are-f...
- boringg 9mo ago
  One of the major reasons thats we have a climate crisis is that we knee capped Nuclear in the 80s and prevent new reactors and new technology development for 40 years. That left the only providers able to fill the gap were fossil based (oil, coal and gas) - which pumped out significant CO2. Not surprised at all that oil and gas is still trying to protect themselves from competition.
jltsiren 9mo ago
Wild edge cases are to be expected when you do things at scale. If you build 20 buildings in different regions, at least one of them will likely face a once-in-1000-years natural disaster. And it's difficult to estimate how bad that particular kind of once-in-1000-years event can be, because you probably only have a century or two of reliable data.

Moldoteck 9mo ago

You don't need to prevent it. You just need to prevent a catastrophe and even Fukushima did it relatively well - nobody died or will die from radiation. Current benchmark for (future) gen4 designs is having consequences limited to the area of the plant, think of 3MI but as worst case. But imo it's still an overkill, nuclear is one of the safest sources in terms of human deaths/kwh and the stat only gets better with gen3/3+

lostlogin 9mo ago
> You just need to prevent a catastrophe and even Fukushima did it relatively well - nobody died or will die from radiation. “As of 2020, the total number of cancer and leukemia instances has risen to six cases according to the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO).[5] In 2018 one worker died from lung cancer as a result from radiation exposure.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_nuclear_accident_casualties https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_nuclear_accident_cas... These are small numbers compared to the number that died due to the tsunami and the massive evacuation (to avoid radiation injuries). The frustrating bit is that they could have avoided it all.
- chickenbig 9mo ago
  The linked to article makes a different claim " The workers' compensation claims that have been recognized by labor authorities include six cases of workers who developed cancer or leukemia due to radiation exposure " So compensation has been requested for cancers, of which one death has been reported. I point to a Forbes opinion piece from a pro-nuclear person https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2018/09/06/no-the-cancer-death-was-probably-not-from-fukushima/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2018/09/06/no-the-ca... .
  - lostlogin 9mo ago
    Were you trying to reply to the parent? That’s more or less what I said.
    - 9mo ago