5 ms·

Obama announces nuclear breakthrough on landmark India trip

16 points by rickdale 12y ago

Mithaldu 12y ago
By breakthrough they're sadly not talking about a scientific discovery, but about a trade agreement.
- slashnull 12y ago
  Mh, it's unclear in the article, but perhaps the US nuclear energy companies will finally be able to install the new and safer designs they haven't been able to build because of the high-profile fuckups of the old, unsafe designs?
aaron987 12y ago
Headline bait. I was expecting some exciting breakthrough in nuclear reactor technology or something.
dogma1138 12y ago
Eh? how is this even possible considering that India did not sign the NPT also considering that technically in that weird hate-love 4 way between Russia, India, China and Pakistan the US is historically been supporting Pakistan while India had closer relations with Russia. The NPT thing alone is like the US openly providing nuclear technology to Israel, or building nuclear reactors in Iran. Not to mention that even tho this is purely "civilian"(like that thing actually exists) nuclear technology it sure will make Pakistan nervous, and when either India or Pakistan gets nervous Russia and China get on alert. If the US actually opens trading in nuclear technology with a non NPT signatory what will prevent Russia from doing the same with N. Korea or what will prevent Iran from boasting see the Americans selling nuclear tech to a "rogue state" why can't we buy it as a NPT signatory? This is either a very misquoted or misguided story, or a one big FU from the US to one of the most important treaties of the 20th century.
- hga 12y ago
  I'd bet on the FU ... but of course you can blame that on Bush ^_^ (those issues were ... finessed back then, this is about liability). As for: "Not to mention that even tho this is purely "civilian"(like that thing actually exists) nuclear technology" To a great degree it does exist with civilian reactor designs that can't easily change fuel, e.g. not the Canadian CANDU or Soviet RBMK (Chernobyl) ones. If you brew uranium fuel rods for much longer than a month, you get too much of two undesirable isotopes. One encourages fission, and even in weapons grade plutonium precludes gun assembly warhead designs like Little Boy, the other gives off a lot of heat which is useful in powering deep space probes but otherwise is ranges from a pain in weapons grade to giving off 100kW of heat per what I've read.
  - dogma1138 12y ago
    Not very familiar with the RBMK design, but the CANDU reactor is a heavy water breeder reactor it does produces weapons grade plutonium in quite good amounts. It's fuel cycle isn't optimized for doing so, and they actually intentionally have a burn stage in which the WG PU oxide is mixed with Uranium to burn it out of the spent fuel. But if you tweak the fuel cycle slightly, and forgo the burn phase you are getting a very good PU 239 factory. If anything trade in nuclear technology has to be done with countries like India and Pakistan it should be in nuclear fail safes, and command and control systems. The US system has so many fail safes and checks that even the president unlike in the movies can't launch a nuke with a button, ground silos can be launched within 30-45min, subs can take hours with the new regulations and launch prep. On the other hand no one knows which nuclear fail safes Indian or Pakistani nukes have if any, and their command and control system is completely none existent, India launched a central network in 2009 but as far as it goes for both of those countries nuclear launch capabilities still remain within the hands of local field commanders once the forces go on launch ready alert. Blame Bush, Obama or Osama frankly my dear i don't care, but the worlds first nuclear power, and the defacto "world police" should not trade in nuclear technologies with a country who didn't sign the NPT, especially when it has a nuclear armed neighbor that could turn into an AQ run state over night.
    - 12y ago
slashnull 12y ago
Obama announces India breakthrough on landmark nuclear trip Obama announces nuclear India on landmark breakthrough trip India breakthrough nuclear trip on landmark Obama announce
known 12y ago
The new deal resolved differences over the liability of suppliers to India in the event of a nuclear accident and U.S. demands on tracking the whereabouts of material supplied to the country. "You can always count on Americans to do the right thing - after they've tried everything else." --Winston Churchill

16 points by rickdale 12y ago

Mithaldu 12y ago

By breakthrough they're sadly not talking about a scientific discovery, but about a trade agreement.

slashnull 12y ago
Mh, it's unclear in the article, but perhaps the US nuclear energy companies will finally be able to install the new and safer designs they haven't been able to build because of the high-profile fuckups of the old, unsafe designs?

aaron987 12y ago

Headline bait. I was expecting some exciting breakthrough in nuclear reactor technology or something.

dogma1138 12y ago

Eh? how is this even possible considering that India did not sign the NPT also considering that technically in that weird hate-love 4 way between Russia, India, China and Pakistan the US is historically been supporting Pakistan while India had closer relations with Russia. The NPT thing alone is like the US openly providing nuclear technology to Israel, or building nuclear reactors in Iran. Not to mention that even tho this is purely "civilian"(like that thing actually exists) nuclear technology it sure will make Pakistan nervous, and when either India or Pakistan gets nervous Russia and China get on alert. If the US actually opens trading in nuclear technology with a non NPT signatory what will prevent Russia from doing the same with N. Korea or what will prevent Iran from boasting see the Americans selling nuclear tech to a "rogue state" why can't we buy it as a NPT signatory? This is either a very misquoted or misguided story, or a one big FU from the US to one of the most important treaties of the 20th century.

hga 12y ago
I'd bet on the FU ... but of course you can blame that on Bush ^_^ (those issues were ... finessed back then, this is about liability). As for: "Not to mention that even tho this is purely "civilian"(like that thing actually exists) nuclear technology" To a great degree it does exist with civilian reactor designs that can't easily change fuel, e.g. not the Canadian CANDU or Soviet RBMK (Chernobyl) ones. If you brew uranium fuel rods for much longer than a month, you get too much of two undesirable isotopes. One encourages fission, and even in weapons grade plutonium precludes gun assembly warhead designs like Little Boy, the other gives off a lot of heat which is useful in powering deep space probes but otherwise is ranges from a pain in weapons grade to giving off 100kW of heat per what I've read.
- dogma1138 12y ago
  Not very familiar with the RBMK design, but the CANDU reactor is a heavy water breeder reactor it does produces weapons grade plutonium in quite good amounts. It's fuel cycle isn't optimized for doing so, and they actually intentionally have a burn stage in which the WG PU oxide is mixed with Uranium to burn it out of the spent fuel. But if you tweak the fuel cycle slightly, and forgo the burn phase you are getting a very good PU 239 factory. If anything trade in nuclear technology has to be done with countries like India and Pakistan it should be in nuclear fail safes, and command and control systems. The US system has so many fail safes and checks that even the president unlike in the movies can't launch a nuke with a button, ground silos can be launched within 30-45min, subs can take hours with the new regulations and launch prep. On the other hand no one knows which nuclear fail safes Indian or Pakistani nukes have if any, and their command and control system is completely none existent, India launched a central network in 2009 but as far as it goes for both of those countries nuclear launch capabilities still remain within the hands of local field commanders once the forces go on launch ready alert. Blame Bush, Obama or Osama frankly my dear i don't care, but the worlds first nuclear power, and the defacto "world police" should not trade in nuclear technologies with a country who didn't sign the NPT, especially when it has a nuclear armed neighbor that could turn into an AQ run state over night.
  - 12y ago

slashnull 12y ago

Obama announces India breakthrough on landmark nuclear trip Obama announces nuclear India on landmark breakthrough trip India breakthrough nuclear trip on landmark Obama announce

known 12y ago

The new deal resolved differences over the liability of suppliers to India in the event of a nuclear accident and U.S. demands on tracking the whereabouts of material supplied to the country. "You can always count on Americans to do the right thing - after they've tried everything else." --Winston Churchill