Nuclear reactor cores, like submarines use

[ckm]

These can be home-built, there was even a cool little TV show on Channel 4 ( UK ) about it not too long ago - a young chap made one out of those radioactive paint products and a few other DIY store bits and pieces.

Don't worry - I am very much ecological - I suspect there is some foul play going on as to the true uses of such reactors, as in the usual propaganda about them and what most of us think we know about nuclear reactor energy.

A very small one on a submarine can keep the sub going forever, can also generate oxygen (ie - it can easily power the systems needed to create oxygen, which the crew must have to be able to breathe of course) -

the radiation doesn't leak out if the core is built properly,

if or when it ceased to run - used up it's half-life and so forth - there is no real actual reasons that it should ever be able to leak out into any environment. True it is better to not have anything that feasibly could be destroyed in a way that causes pollution, but frankly I find this whole thing about toxic waste storage going wrong to be unbelievable at best - what is so difficult about putting something into a container or series of containers, and storing it indefinitely. This happens in bank vaults and saftey deposits every day.

[Bruce A. Perreault]

CKM,

Check out this Google search on Galen Winsor... http://www.tinyurl.com/5njhf
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? -Bruce P.

[kenbo0422]

A nuclear reactor like a submarine is bigger than your car.  Thats just the reactor vessel.  They must be pressurized to keep the water coolant from boiling and causing turbulence and steam bubbles on the fuel rods.  This would cause warping and possible release of the encased fuel into the coolant.   About a ton of pressure would do.  Then you would have to have a way to use all that heat safely.  You can't use the coolant going through the reactor vessel directly as this collects metallic sludges and high radiation from those products which we wouldn't want accidently released into the atmosphere.  A secondary system would have to carry the heat from the primary system to produce steam to run a turbine to run a generator.  Thats alot of equipment.  Not cheap.

The running of the reactor requires special startup and shutdown procedures.  You MUST calculate the reactivity in the reactor in order to allow a startup that is slow enough to not overheat and cause a steam explosion inside the core.  The reactivity inside a reactor is very high in the center and lower toward the edges, which means you'll have to know how far to pull the rods in the center and around the outer edges to keep the reactivity even throughout the reactor.  Control of a nuke system is not automated and requires constant attention even when running at steady state conditions.

Materials involved with all the pressure and piping and containment of any nuclear core is going to require expensive stainless steel.  Why?  SS is strong enough and doesn't corrode so easily which helps keep the sludge content down, reducing hot spots of radiation in the system.  The whole system must be contained to keep people from getting close enough to be exposed to radiation.  ANY reactor with power enough to use for your home or more will produce that kind of radiation hazard.  Subs have a unique advantage- the entire reactor room is surrounded by water from the ocean which acts as a shield.

Once you get past all of this stuff... I guess it would be feasible.

Kenbo

[ckm]

It must be feasilbe or the nuke-powered submarines wouldn't exist.

Is sea water that good a shield? If it is, then by all means have a reactor that is surrounded in sea water same as in the sub.

[Bruce A. Perreault]

ckm,

The saltwater cools the core it is not a shield.

? ? ? ? ? ? -Bruce P.