Leader in Nuclear Power?

It’s easy to get a large group of people to agree that the idea of Nuclear is the answer.

It’s prohibitively difficult to get small groups of people to be ok with it in proximity to where they live, mostly because of ignorance.

I was in the industry for almost a decade.
 
Thorium, anyone?

The US and USSR bet on uranium/plutonium instead, because it makes good bombs.

I will believe commercial nuclear power is safe once the private insurance industry is willing to assume the risk -- minus the unlimited taxpayer guarantee we are currently saddled with.
 
WV Mountaineer said:
Yeah I can’t believe people aren’t standing online go live next to the storage of waste nuclear fuel produces. Ignorant indeed.
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Exactly! God forbid we set aside an amount of land for a 100+ years of the nation’s nuclear waste storage equal to what’s needed for TWO energy deficient wind mills, ya know, those things you see thousands and thousands of out west.
 
TaperPin said:
With data centers drawing so much power I would have thought we’d be kicking new nuclear plants into high gear. Anyone have any idea why we’re not? China is taking the lead and they already have cheap power.

Locations of New Nuclear Power Reactor Applications | Nuclear Regulatory Commission

www.nrc.gov www.nrc.gov

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We haven't built a new nuclear plant in close to 40 years other than s plant that went online in 2016 (I think) that construction had actually started on back in the 80's.

Too much litigation to work through to make it with the effort. The Trump admin has eased some rules though and Westinghouse has plans to build a few new plants with construction set to begin in 2030.
 
def90 said:
We haven't built a new nuclear plant in close to 40 years other than s plant that went online in 2016 (I think) that construction had actually started on back in the 80's.

Too much litigation to work through to make it with the effort. The Trump admin has eased some rules though and Westinghouse has plans to build a few new plants with construction set to begin in 2030.
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Vogtle 3 & 4 came online 2023/2024. Construction began in 2009. They are expensive, long term projects. Adding capacity at existing sites is far easier than greenfield construction. Not sure we’ll ever see greenfield again.
 
ChrisAU said:
Exactly! God forbid we set aside an amount of land for a 100+ years of the nation’s nuclear waste storage equal to what’s needed for TWO energy deficient wind mills, ya know, those things you see thousands and thousands of out west.
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Do you know that you can fit all the nuclear waste ever created by nuclear power plants into an Olympic sized pool? That's it.
 
Nuclear plants take forever to build. One started now will be for the benefit of a different people that comes to occupy this land. Until they're ready to make that move we get dumb contraptions like windmills to keep us distracted.
 
The new "AI Action Plan" effectively streamlines data center development, so you can most likely expect to see the reliance on gas turbines to supply the necessary supplemental power for the immediate future.

www.whitehouse.gov

Accelerating Federal Permitting of Data Center Infrastructure

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered: Section  1. Policy and
www.whitehouse.gov www.whitehouse.gov
Section  1. Policy and Purpose. My Administration has inaugurated a golden age for American manufacturing and technological dominance. We will pursue bold, large-scale industrial plans to vault the United States further into the lead on critical manufacturing processes and technologies that are essential to national security, economic prosperity, and scientific leadership. These plans include artificial intelligence (AI) data centers and infrastructure that powers them, including high‑voltage transmission lines and other equipment. It will be a priority of my Administration to facilitate the rapid and efficient buildout of this infrastructure by easing Federal regulatory burdens.

In addition, my Administration will utilize federally owned land and resources for the expeditious and orderly development of data centers. This usage will be done in a manner consistent with the land’s intended purpose — to be used in service of the prosperity and security of the American people.
--
(ii) natural gas turbines, coal power equipment, nuclear power equipment, geothermal power equipment, and any other dispatchable baseload energy sources, including electrical infrastructure (including backup power supply) constructed or otherwise used principally to serve a Data Center Project;
 
I worked on the building process of building nuclear plants. The regulation ( which are needed) are a pain in the ass. For example, we need to test a loop of cooling water we had just completed, we need five different inspectors to sign off okaying the opening of the valve. The problem was getting all five together at the same time, to sign off and observe the process. it sometimes took days for that to happen. That is one small example of what we had to go through. It was a daily occurrence of delays setting back completion dates. I for one am fully behind building all the plants needs to meet energy demands.
 
Its actually pretty interesting to see how unrefined uranium can be and still have a lot of output. Seems like the tech for refiniing it to 50+ % seems to make it very very efficient and we technically refine a good portion of the "spent" fuel into something thats useful again
 
KurtR said:
This kind of ignorance is pretty much the reason. Smr is the future but we want to stay living in the past
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Ignorance? Does nuclear power not produce waste? There’s a little place in Russia that would disagree with who it ignorant of reality.

If you’d like to have a discussion instead of acting like that I’m all for it. But, nothing is the one stop answer for the future of power. So acting otherwise is plain arrogant.

There’s a reason it hasn’t been adopted as the go to answer for our power needs. And, ignorance isn’t it. it has everything to do with what I said. That’s the facts of it. For good reason.

Nobody wants to live around it because of that. Nobody. That’s just reality. A train wrecks and spills coal, a month later it’s cleaned up. Natural gas has no long term affect. Nuclear waste gets out you’ve got a dang desert. If a reactor blows up you got a grave yard for centuries. If a dictator decides to blow the damn plant up, it’s going to be bad. Etc…..

You are right. Ignorance abounds. But, I’m not too dumb to figure out why it isn’t leading the field in alternative energy.


Tell me again who’s ignorant. I want to hear all your wisdom. The world isn’t scripted. Stuff is going to happen. Ignorance is dismissing it as it won’t.


What a dumbass thing to say.
 
WV Mountaineer said:
There’s a reason it hasn’t been adopted as the go to answer for our power needs. And, ignorance isn’t it.
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Actually….. it basically is.
There is no cleaner form of electricity per kw hour produced.
Sure, there’s no such thing as a free lunch with energy-but as mentioned, waste is radically smaller than any other form of energy.
Using a failing USSR plant as the reason we shouldn’t go nuclear is EXACTLY why we haven’t. It scares people who are uninformed, and therefore it’s unpopular.
 
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