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Robert Steinhaus Steinhaus

Jun 30, 2013
06:06

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Are Sodium Cooled Fast Reactors and Molten Salt Reactors equivalently safe? If you want to build a lot of reactors in an effort to improve the climate, you have to care first about choosing the safest nuclear technology available. I would like to suggest that the safer reactor technology is molten salt reactors. Molten salts do not react with water, or cement, or the general materials that you find inside a nuclear reactor building while hot liquid sodium does while producing very large quantities of hydrogen, which in the presence of a sodium fire from a coolant leak, is easily capable of exploding and literally blowing the roof off of a 3 meter thick steel and cement reactor containment structure. A 300 MWe IFR could produce in an extreme accident (tsunami or flood) a combined sodium fire/hydrogen explosion releasing 1.74 x 10^7 MJ of energy (estimate based on the explosive potential of 1650 tons of hot sodium and 803.4 million liters of hydrogen produced by reaction of hot sodium with air, cement, or water) A 300 MWe LFTR could not produce an explosion with materials found in the reactor or with water. Safety first before cost, convenience, or embarrassment on how we have invested decades of DOE research dollars with so little to show in the way positive result including no current commercial sodium cooled reactor currently operating in the United States after more than four decades of effort. Thorium LFTRs and MSRs are significantly safer than Sodium Cooled Fast Reactor designs that are capable of extreme accidents under the right conditions. Sodium Cooled Fast Reactors have one of the highest startup inventories of radionuclides and fissile startup fuel of any reactor design (about 3X a LWR and about 15X an equivalent sized MSR). Reactive Sodium Coolant has fire and explosive potential far exceeding the potential of hot Molten Salts. When you put these two fact together, Sodium Cooled Fast Reactors are just less safe than competing designs including Molten Salt cooled MSRs. The safest reactor technology deserves to be developed and commercialized first and the less intrinsically safe reactor technology deserves to be assigned a lesser development priority. It is very possible for sodium cooled fast reactor designs to have been worked on for over four decades and still have VERY SERIOUS potential safety problems latent in the design that could be the seeds for a future major nuclear accident. It may be remembered that the actual discussions that Dr. Alvin Weinberg had with AEC reactor development that got him fired were discussions relating to the relative safety of Molten Salt Reactors versus Sodium Cooled Fast Reactors including the Liquid Metal Fast Breeder Reactor of his day. Weinberg, with all his decades of reactor design experience, felt there was a real and meaningful difference in the relative safety between Molten Salt Reactor and Sodium Cooled Fast Reactors, a difference important enough to get in the face of AEC top brass (Milton Shaw) and Congressmen (Chet Hollifeld) and if necessary stand your ground and fight [1]. Dr. Weinberg felt the safety difference between the reactor technologies were important enough, if necessary, to risk losing his position as ORNL Lab Director. In the end the issues, which easily could affect the future of nuclear power generation, should come down to a careful review of the competing technologies. I believe that the: 1) A Large radio-isotopic inventory inside a Sodium Cooled Fast Reactor that exceeds the radio-isotopic inventory of MSRs or LWRs by an order of magnitude or more. 2) Chemical stored energy in the hot sodium coolant - which is capable of producing a truly large sodium fire and hydrogen explosion capable of driving a very large reactor isotopic inventory out into the environment. These two safety liabilities will always remain latent in the Sodium Cooled Fast Reactor design, regardless of how clever the engineered systems that future reactor designers provide to try to make this fast reactor technology safe. An experienced, wise, and skillful reactor designer might be able to design a Sodium Cooled Fast Reactor that operates without major mishap for 30 years, but the potential for a really serious accident involving the loss of a large portion of the sodium coolant and a subsequent hydrogen explosion that breaches reactor containment is still out there, and remains an ever present risk. The fissile and radiological fission product inventory of a sodium cooled fast reactor is much larger than a LFTR or LWR of the same size. When you combine a very large radiological inventory, from a pool style fast reactor derived from the IFR design. ***SAFETY Concerns regarding Sodium Cooled Fast Reactors*** fuel and radio-isotopic inventory comparison (IFR versus MSR) - A 300 MWe IFR would have ~5400 kgs of Plutonium-Uranium A 300 MWe MSR would have ~240 kgs of U-233 fuel So a IFR has a much higher fuel and radio-isotopic inventory (22X) than a MSR "Explosive Driving Force" Comparison (IFR versus MSR) - A 300 MWe IFR could produce a combined sodium fire/hydrogen explosion releasing 1.74 x 10^7 MJ of energy or the equivalent of 378 thousand gallons of gasoline (estimate based on the explosive potential of 1650 tons of hot sodium and 803.4 million liters of hydrogen produced by reaction of sodium coolant with cement or water) When you compare the explosive potential and potential for fire of a Molten Salt Reactor and a sodium cooled fast reactor, the facts are that a sodium cooled fast reactor could in an extreme accident be subject to hydrogen explosions and fire that could not happen to a Molten Salt Reactor. Better than dreaming up ever more exotic and expensive engineering controls to make Sodium Cooled Fast Reactors adequately safe, it is better to just switch to a better and less reactive coolant (Flibe molten salt) and use a fuel cycle (Thorium) that permits complete consumption of the nuclear fuel in a safer and less expensive thermal neutron reactor. That way you gain the benefits that Sodium Cooled Fast Reactors can offer without suffering the liabilities. [1] - How Milton Shaw Blew the Nuclear Safety Issue. http://nucleargreen.blogspot.com/2010/05/how-milton-shaw-blew-nuclear-safety.html [2] - Sodium Fires - https://www.thefpa.co.uk/mainwebsite/resources/document/sodium%20safety.pdf

2013electricpowerjudges 2013electricpowerjudges

Jul 17, 2013
05:15

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If the IBR is such a compelling solution, why has it been abandoned? The proposal does not give an adequate explanation as to why this idea, which has already been introduced, has not been taken up. The arguments against it need to be dispassionately presented first, and then they must either be refuted or the author must tell how these objections can be overcome. If the author wants to make a convincing case here, the thing to do is to look at the original objections to IBR and blow holes in those objections. The current proposal does not say what was wrong with the analyses that caused IBR to be dropped.

Barry Brook

Jul 24, 2013
03:12

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"If the author wants to make a convincing case here, the thing to do is to look at the original objections to IBR and blow holes in those objections." Tom Blees has done EXACTLY that. Please download his (now a free PDF) book, and refer to pages 324-334. The 1994 senate objections are taken apart, piece by piece.

2013electricpowerjudges 2013electricpowerjudges

Jul 29, 2013
02:12

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Very interesting technology, taken seriously in the UK; GE and Hitatchi are also looking at this; proposal could be clearer in its presentation but worth calling attention to.

Ed Pheil

Aug 1, 2013
08:15

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I'm going to have to agree with RobertSteinhouse on the safety front of MSR's being better than sodium. Also, the fuel processing for an IFR with the nead to strip the cladding, and dissolve the fuel and worry about criticality are much more expensive and risk prone than an MSR where the fuel is already liquid, and the first thing you do in processing the fuel is to strip the fissile material out by passing fluorine gas through the liquid fuel in a processing column, immediately eliminating the criticality concern and returning the fuel to the core. Molten salts also chemically bind to most of the fission products, such that if there is any kind of leak the FP's will remain bound and freeze with the salt. I am not tied to either the fast or thermal liquid fueled MSR, until more work is done on both, or I can study and understand the +/- of both, but I know they are better than solid fuel and attempts to get solid fuel to last a long time, then reprocessing it.

Tom Blees

Aug 1, 2013
08:58

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In response to edphell: In regard to claiming a safety advantage for MSRs you have to dismiss the probabilistic risk assessment studies of the PRISM outright (they’re described in the proposal). As for difficulties in fuel processing, the EBR-II team recycled tens of thousands of fuel pins. Pyroprocessing makes it very easy to do. Criticality issues are well-understood, and the fact that pyroprocessing is a non-aqueous process greatly reduces criticality issues. As for getting “solid fuel to last a long time”, IFRs can easily get a 20% burnup and likely substantially more. You say you “know they [MSRs] are better than solid fuel”. Since IFRs are ready to build but MSRs still require considerable R&D, that is a bold statement indeed. The molten salt reactor that operated briefly at ORNL had its share of problems, and they cannot be glibly dismissed, nor can it be assumed that others will not crop up in developing commercial molten salt reactors. While I suspect that challenges can be overcome and that someday we might see MSRs being deployed in great numbers, until that time it might be wise to meet the rosy outlook of MSR proselytes with a few words from Hyman Rickover: "The academic-reactor designer is a dilettante. He has not had to assume any real responsibility in connection with his projects. He is free to luxuriate in elegant ideas, the practical shortcomings of which can be relegated to the category of 'mere technical details.' The practical-reactor designer must live with these same technical details. Although recalcitrant and awkward, they must be solved and cannot be put off until tomorrow. Their solution requires manpower, time and money. Unfortunately for those who must make far-reaching decisions without the benefit of an intimate knowledge of reactor technology, and unfortunately for the interested public, it is much easier to get the academic side of an issue than the practical side. For a large part those involved with the academic reactors have more inclination and time to present their ideas in reports and orally to those who will listen. Since they are innocently unaware of the real but hidden difficulties of their plans, they speak with great facility and confidence. Those involved with practical reactors, humbled by their experiences, speak less and worry more." Hyman Rickover

Roger Blomquist

Aug 1, 2013
09:08

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robertsteinhaus has actually pointed out an advantage of the IFR. If fueled with materials from used LWR fuel, a large inventory is a benefit in that the IFR is disposing of the long-lived transuranics that make geologic disposal challenging. It converts them to relatively short-lived fission products (and electricity, of course) that would be easy to sequester for the 300 years required.

Thomas Fanning

Aug 1, 2013
11:33

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Tom, Thank you for the quote from Admiral Rickover. This needs to be taught at every engineering school (nuclear or otherwise). In response to Mr. Steinhaus, your analysis is very deeply flawed from the first sentence: "If you want to build a lot of reactors in an effort to improve the climate, you have to care first about choosing the safest nuclear technology available." I am truly awed by the propaganda behind the LFTR, but one thing it is NOT is "available technology". The *known* design and safety challenges for molten salt are significant. In contrast, 30 sodium-cooled fast reactors have operated worldwide, several continue to operate, and others are currently under construction. For those curious about safety, your arguments about SFR safety go directly against your first citation. You conjure an impossible accident scenario to make your case. The sudden, instantaneous mixture of a large volume of sodium and water is an "academic fantasy" and provides absolutely no insight into reactor safety. The extensive operational and testing experience of SFRs, including real problems and accidents, demonstrates otherwise. The following authoritative references on actual experience may be of interest: http://www-pub.iaea.org/books/IAEABooks/7581/Fast-Reactor-Database-2006-Update http://www-pub.iaea.org/books/iaeabooks/8667/Status-of-Fast-Reactor-Research-and-Technology-Development http://www-pub.iaea.org/books/IAEABooks/8872/Structural-Materials-for-Liquid-Metal-Cooled-Fast-Reactor-Fuel-Assemblies-Operational-Behaviour http://www-pub.iaea.org/books/IAEABooks/6496/Validation-of-Fast-Reactor-Thermomechanical-and-Thermohydraulic-Codes http://www-pub.iaea.org/books/iaeabooks/6057/Unusual-Occurrences-during-LMFR-Operation http://www-pub.iaea.org/books/IAEABooks/8225/Decommissioning-of-Fast-Reactors-After-Sodium-Draining

Stephen Foster

Aug 14, 2013
10:52

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I really find arguments over theoretical advantages of MSRs vs. LMFBRs self defeating. The main advantage of Liquid-Metal Fast Breeders (LMFBR)s is that they have been developed and exhaustively tested already. The IFR, for example, is a sustainable nuclear design that is ready to go NOW. I respectfully ask nuclear proponents to get behind ALL viable nuclear technologies with priority ranked according to time-to-deployment. We should all support GEN III plants TODAY. We should push for commercial demonstration of a LMFBR like the IFR for deployment in the near future, say 5 years, and push for aggressive research leading to demonstration of several different innovative reactor concepts including molten-salt reactors (say within 10 years). What all this needs, however, as a necessary condition is an enabling political environment. We must first see the culture of fear dismissed (e.g. repeal LNT as basis for regulation, end the fiction that reactor-grade plutonium is weapons material in waiting) and the hostile regulatory barriers-to-entry lowered dramatically. Without this first, NONE of our pet nuclear concepts will see the light of day and the planet will continue to burn while we choke on the fumes. So please, no internecine battles! We must focus on the common enemy, which is carbon and its patron power structures - the world's wealthiest corporations and their government protectors. A unified front is essential if we are to ever see effective nuclear solutions implemented in a realistic manner.

Edward Greisch

Aug 15, 2013
01:35

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robertsteinhaus and others who prefer molten salt reactors: The answers are in this book: "Plentiful Energy, The Story of the Integral Fast Reactor" by Charles E. Till and Yoon Il Chang, 2011. Don't be Luddites by perfectionism. 1. The decision to shut down Argonne National Lab's [alias Fermilab] effort on the IFR was made by the anti-nuclear religion. There was no rational reason. 2. IFR alias PRISM is ready to roll. Molten salt is not. PRISM has GE as a backer and factory. GE already has another reactor pre-certified for factory production. Any delay is an extension of burning fossil fuels. 3. Sodium is the best coolant. Your fire problem is solved. 4. Nuclear is far too safe already. Burning coal kills a million people each year and coal is the #1 source of the CO2 that is causing Global Warming. We can't wait another minute to stop burning coal. Under BAU, desertification will cause agriculture to collapse some time between 2050 and 2055. We humans could be extinct by 2060. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/wcc.81/full "Drought Under Global Warming: a Review" by Aiguo Dai atmos.albany.edu/facstaff/adai/ "Preliminary Analysis of a Global Drought Time Series"  by Barton Paul Levenson, not yet published. Delay is genocide. We have to shut down all fossil fuel power plants world wide within 5 years, preferably by the end of 2015. Reference book: “Radiation and Reason, The impact of Science on a culture of fear” by Wade Allison. [The Wade Allison in England, not the other Wade Allison at Harvard.]
http://www.radiationandreason.com/
Professor Allison says we can take up to 10 rems per month, a little more than 1000 times the present “legal” limit. Reference book: “The Rise of Nuclear Fear” by Spencer Weart.

Edward Greisch

Aug 15, 2013
01:30

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Paragraph got compressed and the URL got messed up. It should have been: Reference book: “Radiation and Reason, The impact of Science on a culture of fear” by Wade Allison. [The Wade Allison in England, not the other Wade Allison at Harvard.] 
http://www.radiationandreason.com/
 Professor Allison says we can take up to 10 rems per month, a little more than 1000 times the present “legal” limit.

Ganesan Vaidyanathan

Aug 15, 2013
02:53

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When we look at IFR, it is a complete technology from fuel fabrication to fuel reprocessing. for MSRs the technology demo is needed before we can venture.it is a technology worth pursuing. Regarding sodium fires, except for the large Monju leak none have caused economic penalties.today we can detect sodium or any other fire by visual cameras in addition to leak detectors.Regarding the Radiation effects fast reactors are not that special.The book referred by Asteroidminor,"Radiation & reason" by Wade Allison of Oxford,Uk is worth reading.His viewpoints need to be seriously considered in increasing limits on radiation exposure and bringing down costs of Nuclear Reactors. what is the Coal fired power plant industry about release of radiation to aenvironment. this fact needs to be highlighted in many public forums. Let us build many IFRs and see the results. I am convinced about its success, going by the large amount of R&D and Demo.

Stephen Foster

Aug 15, 2013
10:27

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I would like to add some references to recent work debunking fear of low-level radiation and the myth that ANY dose, not matter how small, should be feared as if some danger far in excess of anything else known to mankind: Dr. Jerry Cutler @ Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission: http://www.nuclearsafety.gc.ca/eng/pdfs/Presentations/Guest-Speakers/2013/20130625-Cuttler-CNSC-Fukushima-and-beneficial-effects-low-radiation.pdf - Antinuclear activists invented and communicate myths that link radiation to cancer and congenital malformations • Radiation myths/scares are not debunked; no outrage? • Professionals? Willful blindness of past and present data? • Nuclear regulations are overprotective and very costly • Nuclear energy and medical applications are blocked • People are frightened; Chernobyl victims suffered not from cancer, but “vegetative vascular dystonia” (depression) “a psychosis of fear” And this just in: "Toxicologist Says NAS Panel 'Misled the World' When Adopting Radiation Exposure Guidelines" http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/08/130813201434.htm It is time to push back hard against misinformation and fear mongering, which appears to have originated at the highest levels decades ago, so nuclear power be properly used to serve us all in de-carbonizing global energy systems and lifting billions of people out of poverty. Again, we must address the toxic political environment as well for this proposal to bear fruit. Being factual, being logical, being right just isn't enough. The human dimension and the instinctual emotive foundations underlying perceptions of reality need to be recognized (see Dr. Jeremy Whitlock in Humanist Perspectives: http://www.humanistperspectives.org/issue185/whitlock.html ). We certainly have seen how those spreading fear and misinformation have been successful in trying to stop nuclear power. Know the enemy and know their methods. It is time to play offense in the name of the environment, in the name of humanity!

Tom Blees

Aug 15, 2013
08:57

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This conversation about the effects of radiation are worth examining, but I don't want readers to get the idea that the IFRs are going to be spewing radiation into the environment. The long-lived radioactive elements will be recycled onsite and consumed, and the short-lived ones will be safely entombed in glass or ceramic for safe disposal (except for the useful elements that we may "harvest" before sequestering the rest). And since no mining will be necessary, any radioactivity from that part of the process will be a non-issue. The ton of depleted uranium that it will take to fuel a gigawatt of fast reactor modules for a year could be carried into the power plant, unshielded, in a couple of milk crates. A friend of mine used to have a chunk of depleted uranium that he used as a doorstop. So the fuel going in will be safe, and the waste coming out will be safely immobilized and shielded on its way to its final disposal site. And because that waste form will not leach anything into the environment for thousands of years while only remaining radioactive for a few hundred, that final resting place won't be problematic.

Stephen Foster

Aug 15, 2013
09:07

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I am approaching this argument from the what I hear from antinukes. They reflexively recoil from nuclear power because of "RADIATION". You should understand how the vast majority of people think on this issue, without the benefit of a university education in physics. Sieverts or REMs ... WTF are you talking about?. All they know is that this is something dangerous and we should all fear it. Why they know this... not sure... is a matter of cultural "memetics". Spiderman was given his powers by being bitten by a radioactive bug. Maybe it was Cold War PSAs about duck and cover. Perhaps it was the Simpsons and "Blinky" the three-eyed fish that lived downstream of the Springfield Nuclear Plant. Whatever the reason, people instinctively fear "nuclear" and "radiation". That is the problem and people who derive their wealth and power from selling fossil fuels understand this. We need to change the memetic channel.

Stephen Foster

Aug 15, 2013
09:02

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I just wish I understood the Prescription for Changing Cultural Memetics a little better. Our role is to do what we do best - spread the Gospel of Science (esp. the maths of energy and truth of nuclear power). I think we have done great things; but, we must acknowledge the role of Money and Power. They have the budgets and socio/political tools with which to REALLY sway public opinion. Those with such means and connections must be be brought on-board (do you hear that Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Richard Branson, et. al?). I know this sounds crass... but, public opinion is "bought" as things currently stand. I wish it could be bought with facts and reason alone. I am hoping that calls to self-preservation re climate disaster work on the rich and influential as well as it does the masses.

Colin Megson

Aug 17, 2013
06:15

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thfanning's quote - "...The sudden, instantaneous mixture of a large volume of sodium and water is an "academic fantasy" and provides absolutely no insight into reactor safety..." should make Robert Steinhaus think deeply about perpetuating this ridiculous argument and the harm it does to pro-nuclear goals. In particular, the goal of the SFR displacing fossil fuel use over the next 3 or 4 decades, before LFTRs come on-stream. These decades are vital to the well being of my grand children and great children, as 'The West' comes under increasing pressure to afford fossil fuel prices as energy demand from 'The Rest' skyrockets. When the lights start to flicker and the real dangers of brown-outs and blackouts stare us in the face, 'Macabre Indifference' will prevail - http://prismsuk.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/electricity-generated-from-fossil-fuels.html - and the scream will go up for your local Small Modular Breeder Reactor. We'll learn to live with them and love them - as long as the electricity is there, 24/7, on demand. And they will be SFRs until LFTRs prove themselves to be as cost effective and/or safer.

Robert Steinhaus Steinhaus

Aug 17, 2013
04:32

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tomblees - The US, and the western world, has been highly invested in the Uranium-Plutonium fuel cycle since the dawn of the Atomic age. A fast reactor, like the IFR you have advanced in this proposal, is potentially capable of closing the Uranium-Plutonium fuel cycle, resulting in a more efficient fuel utilization (up to 100% fuel utilization in SFRs in a fast neutron spectrum). Thorium fuel cycle was known by researches as a potential approach to produce nuclear power from the earliest days of the atomic age, but it was a full decade after Manhattan Project initial choices in nuclear infrastructure were made that Thorium received a practical technology investigation and trial (conversion to Thorium of the Shippingport Atomic Power Station). There are two natural fuels for nuclear power; uranium and thorium. Thorium is unique in that it can be completely consumed in a thermal neutron spectrum reactor. Uranium-Plutonium can’t and requires fast neutrons to completely burn it. Nearly all of our reactors today are thermal-spectrum reactors, and they’re that way because they can be built in their most stable configuration and with the minimum amount of fuel and cost. If you want to minimize nuclear waste, you must be able to completely consume your nuclear fuel. Thorium (not Uranium-Plutonium) is the fuel that can do this in a safe, stable, and economical thermal neutron spectrum reactor. If we propose nuclear solutions to the challenges of global warming, that would entail building literally thousands of new reactors, it would require building 10,000 1GWe reactors to produce another 10 TW planet-wide, and that is about the minimum that will give a decent quality of life to the 10 billion people expected to be on the world in 2050. It is vital to chose the safest technology available when building so many reactors and choice of coolant is a clear design element in safe reactor design. If you are going to build 10,000 reactors, in order to avoid major accidents, it is vital to chose the safest technology available. Reactors based on Molten Salt coolants have an excellent operational record (ORNL MSRE - four years of operation with no safety incidents) and are safer and less reactive chemically than reactors based on hot molten sodium metal. I invite you to point by point, as the CoLab proposal judges recommended, refute the following - ***SAFETY Concerns regarding Sodium Cooled Fast Reactors*** fuel and radio-isotopic inventory comparison (IFR versus MSR) - A 300 MWe IFR would have ~5400 kgs of Plutonium-Uranium A 300 MWe MSR would have ~240 kgs of U-233 fuel So a IFR has a much higher fuel and radio-isotopic inventory (22X) than a MSR "Explosive Driving Force" Comparison (IFR versus MSR) - A 300 MWe IFR could produce a combined sodium fire/hydrogen explosion releasing 1.74 x 10^7 MJ of energy or the equivalent of 378 thousand gallons of gasoline (estimate based on the explosive potential of 1650 tons of hot sodium and 803.4 million liters of hydrogen produced by reaction of sodium coolant with cement or water) A MSR and its chemically stable non-reactive molten salt coolant is incapable of producing an chemical explosion driving the radioactive contents of the reactor into the environment, even in extreme accidents. So far, you primarily offered what amounts to an appeal to authority regarding IFR safety risks saying that a Probable Risk Assessment was turned in filed with NRC in preliminary discussions meant to lead to an application for design certification of the GE PRISM with NRC (and that should silence all objections - even though GE PRISM never completed the design certification process. Anyone can turn in a PRA document to NRC - it is another matter to get NRC's approval of the PRA and to get NRC to approve and design certify the reactor design for safe operation) I invite you to locate inaccuracies in the calculations I made in my original comment above and, in the spirit of the judges recommendations, if you find areas of disagreement, to offer more realistic numbers for the amount of hot molten reactive sodium actually in the IFR reactor design that you advocate and propose. Revealing the amount of hot sodium actually used in your reactor would allow independent analysts to make an informed dispassionate analysis of the safety risks entailed in use of hot sodium as a coolant in fast nuclear reactors like the IFR and commercial GE S-PRISM) Sodium safety by G Manzini and F Parozzi - https://www.thefpa.co.uk/mainwebsite/resources/document/sodium%20safety.pdf

Tom Blees

Aug 17, 2013
09:09

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Robert, you say that there were no safety incidents in four years of operation of the experimental molten salt reactor at Oak Ridge. For starters, four years (presumably with some of that time offline) is hardly a definitive track record. And there were corrosion problems that breached the reactor vessel, so it was hardly problem-free. Also, in later years the U-233 in the system concentrated and nearly reached critical mass (it’s got a much lower critical mass threshhold than would be preferable) before the situation was recognized. And as for breeding, you have to remove the protactinium and let it decay to U-233 if you want to breed, which creates a pure U-233 stream. That’s why the nonproliferation folks freaked out about it. This is not to say that the system is incapable of being perfected, only to point out some of the reasons that it’s simply not ready yet and needs more R&D. Since the PRISM is ready to build and the risk assessment studies I’ve described in my proposal are so fantastic that even if they were off by a factor of 10,000 it would still be a terrific way to power the entire planet with PRISMs, your safety arguments ring pretty hollow. Engineering around the sodium/water possibility is simple—you have the heat exchangers in another structure than the reactor, and the reactor vessel is in an argon atmosphere to boot. I am not going to try, in this limited venue, to argue the point when professional engineers have done exhaustive probabilistic risk assessments (obviously taking into account all your points) and submitted them to the NRC, which did indeed approve them. There are many issues regarding submission for full certification by the NRC, not least of which is the exorbitant cost—about a billion dollars even for an evolutionary light-water reactor. It’s not surprising that GE—with a successful business in LWRs and billions invested in a new LWR design—would shy away from that potential battle, and the unknown costs, of trying to get a fast reactor certified. Their reluctance to do so is not prima facie evidence that the design is faulty. You're grasping at straws. I am not going to get into a pissing match about this because the sodium/water issue has long since been solved. It involves the most basic engineering and of course it was the first thing that came to mind with every sodium reactor ever built. In well over 300 reactor-years of operation of such systems—even considering that most of them were experimental systems that would tend to be more prone to accident—I don’t know of a single instance of radioactive sodium interacting with water. Do you? Your insistence on beating this dead horse is symptomatic of the counterproductive rivalry with IFRs that is too often in evidence among LFTR advocates, and that is really a shame because it just adds fuel to the fires of anti-nuclear activism, and without good reason. I interact with a lot of IFR people and they almost always express sentiments of open-mindedness about LFTRs and advocate continued R&D on them. The reason that we want to begin building IFRs now is because climate change isn’t waiting around, and the sooner we deploy IFRs the sooner we solve the spent fuel problem and begin the path to an energy-abundant future for all mankind—regardless whether LFTRs ever pan out as hoped or not. The PRISM is ready to build. To advocate further delay with hand-wringing about wildly improbably potentialities is a disservice to everyone.

Paul Moonie

Aug 19, 2013
09:06

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It is clear that the market needs the most amount of tools to decarbonise our energy supply, and that includes nuclear. This is the kind of reactor I would like to see accompany a suite of renewables to do the job. There are other reactors which I believe are promising (e.g. Thorium, fusion) but the IFR is ready to go and has completed extensive testing. Thanks Tom for entering the IFR into the competition and good luck.

Mark Graham

Aug 21, 2013
04:00

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Here is part 1 of my 3 part interview with Tom Blees on "the global energy revolution" in 2009, when we talked about the integral fast reactor. You can easily find parts 2 and 3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uJ4NaSVLn0 Steve Foster, thank you for your comments about radiation and cultural memetics. It is a huge and very important subject. My guess is that the answers lie in the field of propaganda, advertising, marketing and psychology. I mean propaganda in the positive sense. To sell an idea like the IFR to scientists and intellectuals one has to have detailed explanations and answers. On the other hand to sell the same idea to the common folk one has to speak their language (which is simple) and have a matching message emotionally, one based on a simple solution. Unfortunately the American mind has been conditioned to think, understand, respond to and form opinions based on sound bites. We can thank the mass media for this. They distract us from key economic, scientific, political and health issues with nonsense such as celebrity failures and screwups. A prime example of this is the daily lead story on yahoo.com.

Robert Bernal

Aug 26, 2013
12:41

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I want to add my two cents... IFR is great, in fact, I voted for this. However, had there been a LFTR option, I would have voted for that despite the fact that it is less developed. The main reasons are that LFTR produces no Pu239 and about 15kg of Pu238 per GWy. And that it requires less fisile for startup. The whole reason why nuclear isn't already powering the world is because of the proliferation concerns about U235 and Pu239. U233 from LFTR is not as easy to make bombs out of as history has shown. When I search it, I can only find one bomb and it was only partially mixed with U233. We should fast track the LFTR (or similar) which requires less fuel for startup and produces far less bomb making material because we don't want a plutonium economy coexisting with a "terrorist economy".

Heather Ferris

Aug 26, 2013
12:57

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When it comes to radiation, the most dangerous part is potential effects on the development of the fetal brain and Epigenetic SNPs. Radiation exposure during pregnancy can lead to an overmigration of neurons, neurotransmission system disorder, and later adult onset schizophrenia among other developmental illnesses. Most people do not understand how vulnerable the fetus is to environmental exposures. There are many exposures we once thought could not hurt the child because we believed in the protective power of the placenta barrier. The last two decades of research have proven this theory wrong. The fetus is far more vulnerable to environmental exposures than we realized. Unfortunately even environmental exposures that seem tiny to some can lead to catastrophic destruction of the human brain. I am not against this project. But, there is a very good reason to be exquisitely careful.

Tom Blees

Aug 26, 2013
08:24

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To fireofenergy: Thank you for your vote. I'd like to just discuss a couple points you raise. Actually, even LFTRs would produce some Pu239, but it's not really an issue because countries that want to make nuclear weapons don't use power reactor fuel. Because it requires very short cycle times, for one thing, weapons-grade plutonium is produced in reactors dedicated to that purpose, frequently in research reactors. The people who developed pyroprocessing for the IFR were very aware of proliferation risks and purposely developed a system that would never, at any time in the fuel cycle, separate plutonium from the rest of the actinides. If you want to extract plutonium from IFR fuel you'd have to run it on a short cycle—as with any type of reactor used for that purpose—and then use an aqueous reprocessing system to extract the plutonium. This is an entirely different system, the same one that the French use for their reprocessing and MOX fabrication. Every country with nuclear weapons has such facilities. They are not a part of IFR technology. You wrote: "The whole reason why nuclear isn't already powering the world is because of the proliferation concerns about U235 and Pu239." If that was the reason, then the countries that already have nuclear power plants would be powering their grids with predominantly nuclear power, which is only the case with a couple countries (France and Sweden). I would venture to suggest that a bigger reason why nuclear isn't predominant is because it threatened the fossil fuel industries and has been undermined by them and others who are sometimes unwittingly in league with them, such as some environmental groups. See this article for an example, that reveals how Friends of the Earth was started with money from an oil company: tinyurl.com/m2mrjby It's not just fossil fuel companies that don't want to see nuclear displace them. Governments derive huge sums from taxes and fees on fossil fuel extraction and use. The trivial amount of fuel that nuclear plants—even lightwater reactors—use to produce prodigious amounts of energy brings virtually nothing into government coffers. Since LWR use only about 0.6% of the energy in uranium, imagine the ridiculously small amount of fuel used by an IFR that extracts virtually 100%. For a one-gigawatt reactor of the IFR variety, a mere ton of depleted uranium—about two milk crates full—would power the plant for a year. And depleted uranium is free. We've got about 700,000 tons of it just sitting around waiting to be used. That's right: We could produce 700,000 gigawatt-years of electricity using IFRs with that otherwise pretty useless material. And that's just the depleted uranium we've got in the States, other countries have big inventories too. Plus we've got about 70,000 tons of spent LWR fuel, (aka "nuclear waste"), and some weapons-grade material too from dismantled warheads. All of it can be transformed into electricity in IFRs, and recycled using a purposefully proliferation-resistant technology.

Tom Blees

Aug 26, 2013
08:57

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hc ferris: Certainly nuclear power system operators should be exquisitely careful. But don't assume that nuclear power plants necessarily end up leaking radiation into the environment. They are designed to contain it, and are quite good at that. If you look at studies on radiation exposure from nuclear power plants that have been conducted by reputable organizations (WHO, UNSCEAR, etc) you'll find that the unfortunately ubiquitous scare "studies" by people such as Mangano and others simply don't hold up to scrutiny. Fetal development can be drastically and tragically affected by many factors, radiation being very low on the list of probable threats.

William Mosby

Aug 28, 2013
01:03

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I worked at Argonne-West from 1986 to 2005, in the safeguards measurement field. I got to know EBR-II and some of its fuel cycle pretty well, and took an interest in other reactor systems and in the IFR and the PRISM system that stemmed from it. It would be a wonderful contribution to humanity to build enough PRISM reactors to help mitigate climate change. It would be something like 20 years too late and counting, but perhaps it would take the edge off of the worst case scenario we seem to be heading for. Best of luck with this!

Luca Bertagnolio

Aug 28, 2013
06:39

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Glad I could cast my vote to support all your intiatives around the IFR and the other ideas you explained so well in "Prescriprion for the Planet", Tom. Happy to see that Barry is also here, supporting you. Godspeed!

Carl Holder

Aug 28, 2013
01:39

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The Department of Energy began GenIV with a “Technology Roadmap, Ten Nations Preparing Today for Tomorrow’s Energy Needs,” published in December 2002. There are 6 systems recommended for R&D: Gas-Cooled FR, Lead-Cooled FR, Molten Salt Reactor, Sodium-Cooled FR, Supercritical-Water-Cooled Reactor, Very-High-Temperature Reactor. Challenging technology goals for Generation IV nuclear energy systems are defined in this roadmap in four areas: sustainability, economics, safety and reliability, and proliferation resistance and physical protection. By striving to meet the technology goals, new nuclear systems can achieve a number of long-term benefits that will help nuclear energy play an essential role worldwide. To play an essential role, future nuclear energy systems will need to provide (1) manageable nuclear waste, effective fuel utilization, and increased environmental benefits, (2) competitive economics, (3) recognized safety performance, and (4) secure nuclear energy systems and nuclear materials. In December 2006, DOE published the U.S. Generation IV Fast Reactor Strategy. From the Introduction, “DOE has focused the fast reactor program on a single concept, the sodium-cooled fast reactor (SFR). “The SFR relies on technologies already developed and demonstrated for sodium-cooled reactors and associated fuel cycles that have successfully been built and operated in worldwide fast reactor programs. Overall, approximately 300 reactor years of operating experience have been logged on SFRs including 200 years on smaller test reactors and 100 years on larger demonstration or prototype reactors. In the United States, SFR technology was employed in the 20 megawatt electric (MWe) Experimental Breeder Reactor (EBR) II that operated from 1963 to 1994. EBR-II R&D included development and testing of metal fuel and passive safety tests. The 400 megawatt thermal (MWt) Fast Flux Test Facility (FFTF) was completed in 1980. FFTF operated successfully for ten years with a full core of mixed oxide (MOX) fuel and performed SFR materials, fuels, and component testing. The U.S. SFR development program stalled with cancellation of the Clinch River demonstration reactor in 1983, although DOE research for advanced SFR technology continued until 1994…”

Carl Holder

Aug 28, 2013
01:18

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IFR - YEA

Cai Xingwang

Aug 29, 2013
08:16

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IFR - YEA

Maxim Maltchevski

Aug 29, 2013
08:12

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There's no way the climate change problem is going to be solved without heavy reliance on nuclear power. All naive attempts to build wind turbines and solar panels will naturally fade away as the government support dries out. If you are serious about tackling the climate change support Tom.

Nancy Holt

Sep 6, 2013
03:00

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Congratulations Tom! It is past time for IFR to be revived. Thank you for all you do to help us understand the nuclear power potential of IFR and the need to move immediately in the US to reduce the deadly impacts on human health from the coal fired electric plants and the radioactive ash that is not treated as hazardous waste. In fact, the coal ash waste is often applied to farm fields and sold to the unsuspecting farmer as "fertilizer!" Let's all help raise awareness of this method of using spent nuclear waste to generate electricity--the world needs to know! Nancy

Matt Robinson

Sep 6, 2013
05:48

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IFR has my vote!