and these guys run nuclear power stations....

Oh that was just some old drums full of dioxins and pcb's, don't worry
your pretty little head over it.

 

Yep, so simple it couldn't possibly work...nor would breeder reactors.
8^\ Damn cat's out of the bag might as well put it to 'effin work.
<grump> sorry guys it's an old soap box and I shouldn't be on it.

 

Did you actually read what I said?

France is the only country with a viable safe fully formed nuclear power
industry. Pretty much general knowlege.

 

I take it you are aware then that some great small reactor designs already
exist and that PFR was a complete success except for the (non nuke) steam
evaporator design. The latter was eventually rectified.

And Fast Reactors are not the only way to burn Pu in a fuel pellet matrix

 

I'd have thought Japan ticks those boxes too.

 

No, sadly they've had a fubar or two also. One as famously covered up
as one of yours was.

 

Might want to reread that...just because they haven't made a mistake
doesn't mean it can't / wont happen. I favour nuclear power...I also
favour finding ways to recycle the waste from the old inefficient
reactors for use in newer better designs. That makes me an exception
in the states.

 

Exactly! But there are too many uneducated Not In My BackYard types
out there killing the possibility. I don't claim to be a genius or an
expert...but damn even I can see it can be done safely, smartly and
efficiently.

 

Hmm that's a bit more complicated than the odd casual NG post.

Yeah they have 55 nuclear power plants. Mostly LWR. In 2000 they published a
long term pro nuclear strategy and that included a closed fuel cycle with
reprocessing and mixed oxide fuel. I understood that their LWR design could
burn this MOX. Japan was hit hard by the various oil crises.

They also had a Fast Breeder program, Monju, which went critical in 1994.
They took up good British design and sodium cooled it and used MOX fuel.
What they didn't do was weld properly and in 1995 a major sodium leak caused
a hideous accident and fire. Which is to say they didn't build it like
Doomreay at all.

Then on the power side around the time of publication of the strategy
document they had another bad accident. An unscheduled Criticality in the
reprocessing plant. The absolute No No. And reading the docs it was cack
handed plant design and process management. 2 died quickly and 60odds are
"waiting".

So since those problems public opinion has soured, postponements have
happened, lots of protest. Then there was another death, though TBF it was
steam generating plant but poor maintenance control contributed. So is the
Japanese program still viable? I don't know anything about their new
government but I'm thinking - doubtful.

I think the UK still has the ability to design, build and run a safe
industry. I don't say that based on the current UK nuclear sector, but on
the offshore oil industry. Britain pretty much leads and if anything those
have been tougher nuts to crack.

 

I'm not defending my posting - just basing it on observation of Range
Rover Heater woes - only occur when polen filter maintenance is
forgotten - though often it's bit of the destroyed and rotting filter
jamming the fan from rotating...

--

 

Well they way I would do it is this.

Split the national grid up into small segments. Have interconnects mainly
for resiliance and maintenance.
Each segment gets 2 small modular nukes with 200% overall capacity.

Then, it's up to the local population to decide. If they don't like it, they
get switched off. They run on whatever other carbon zero generation plant
happens to be within the area. Wind, wave, tidal, hydro etc.

How long will it take the the great majority of the population to wake up
and small the roses? and to deal the the Reds and Anarchist opportunists
who have alighted on the Green movement. One really cold fucking night, or
two?

Given how valuable fossil fuel stocks are as feedstuff for the chemical
industry over the next few thousand years I don't think it should be used
for power generation, other than emergency and backup.

 

According to Greenpeace they seem to have had a couple of minor
incidents, as has Switzerland - actually clockmaker country has had only
one incident but they've only got four reactors.

My guess is that the French are willing to spend proper money on the
infrastructure and reactors and thus are probably less in danger of
cutting corners than countries with a more entrepreneurial approach.

 

Is that the ghost of Fred Hoyle?

My old mate who used to work down the pit on coal cutting machinery
years ago (and later became the head of Design Technology at a Secondary
School) always says that coal is to precious to just dig up and burn.

--
+-------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Pete Fisher at Home: |
| Voxan Roadster Yamaha WR250Z/Supermoto "Old Gimmer's Hillclimber" |
| Gilera GFR * 2 Moto Morini 2C/375 Morini 350 "Forgotten Error" |
+-------------------------------------------------------------------+

 

Yeah they believe in Infrastructure and are pretty hot on Protocol. It's
really tough to manage large teams of people to the level and extent
required, and keep them on the boil for years. The them and us management
style in the UK isn't so conducive.

 

We didn't cover ours up and everybody knows any background radiation
in Cumbria (1) (2) (3) comes from Chernobyl and the fact that there
isn't any for a large part of the area between the old Windscale site
and Chernobyl is purely a matter of luck for those that live in the
clear areas.

(1) That's where Windscale was just in case the colonials don't know
the area.

(2) There's rather a lot of it.

(3) We even built a re-processing plant there because nobody would
know (4) if any background radiation was old stuff or evidence of
another mishap.

(4) Well, they would know but it'd be kept secret.

 

He is completely fucking right. It's one of those obvious insanities that
blight us. Like an inability to regulate population. Or religion ;o)

We had to use it for a few centuries but the time is pretty much past. We
may as well deplete resources in extreme environment now, while demand and
price is high, but all the accessable resources could be mothballed.

Bio engineering will probably develop the technology to produce feedstuffs
and in volume but way way on down in the far future.

 

On Sun, 6 Dec 2009 19:51:16 -0000, "'Hog"

snip>

I think it was last week the preliminary designs were approved for the
next generation of reactors but it might have been the week before. I
don't think we'll be seeing the unemployed figures dropping in the uk.

 

Ah. That would certainly cause an over-current.

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/nov/27/nuclear-power-reactor-design

"It also complains that the reactor design was submitted in feet and inches
rather than metric figures."

**** sake.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metrication

"Only three countries (Burma (Myanmar), Liberia, and the United States) have
yet to adopt the International System of Units as their official system of
measurement."

 

Depressing isn't it.

One thing the red^H^H^Greens are right about is that building a few massive
stations and loosing 60% of the generated capacity in transmission losses is
a ludicrous idea. And also huge stations are much harder to maintain and
inevitably have more weaknesses.

Years ago small reactor designs were evolved which are safe by shape and
rather maintenance Lite.

Well, you should be happy!