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Is nuclear fission safe?

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ruveyn
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24 Jan 2013, 1:58 pm

Question14 wrote:
So bydoing fusion, you would in affect be controling a very, very tiny star?


Not exactly. What causes hydrogen to fuse in a star is the energy of the gravitational field pulling all the hydrogen in a cloud into and onto itself. Controlled fusion here on either would be done using electromagnetic forces or the light pressure of multiple high power lasers on a hydrogen target.

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Guilliman
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24 Jan 2013, 3:23 pm

The fusion reactor being build now uses electromagnetically controlled ionized plasma to get enough energy (heat) to cause fusion. The downsides of this is, plasma melts EVERYTHING, so if the magnetic containment fails or even weakens for a tenth of a second, you could be looking at a melting reactor. The plasma is radioactive, and it does cause the electromagnets and it's container to get radioactive. But the plus side is, the time the parts remain radioactive is very small (years iirc). So if they do need to replace parts of the reactor, the radioactive parts only need to be stored safely away for a decade at most before being perfectly safe.

I believe they use lasers to kick-start the plasma though. I should really read up on the reactor they're using. Getting confused with the different possible mechanics to achieve fusion right now.



ruveyn
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24 Jan 2013, 4:48 pm

Guilliman wrote:
The fusion reactor being build now uses electromagnetically controlled ionized plasma to get enough energy (heat) to cause fusion. The downsides of this is, plasma melts EVERYTHING, so if the magnetic containment fails or even weakens for a tenth of a second, you could be looking at a melting reactor. The plasma is radioactive, and it does cause the electromagnets and it's container to get radioactive. But the plus side is, the time the parts remain radioactive is very small (years iirc). So if they do need to replace parts of the reactor, the radioactive parts only need to be stored safely away for a decade at most before being perfectly safe.

I believe they use lasers to kick-start the plasma though. I should really read up on the reactor they're using. Getting confused with the different possible mechanics to achieve fusion right now.


The containment is an electromagnetic field. If the field fails, the fusion immediately stop. The plasma never touches the physical walls of the field container.

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25 Jan 2013, 12:27 am

ruveyn wrote:

The containment is an electromagnetic field. If the field fails, the fusion immediately stop. The plasma never touches the physical walls of the field container.

ruveyn


Yeah that was what I said, perhaps not clearly though. Basically I said, if the magnetic containment fails, you'll have plasma touching the walls of the reactor which will melt it. The walls of the reactor currently get radiated either way. Fusion would stop immediately, but the plasma will melt your reactor walls if the containment fails.



BlueMax
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25 Jan 2013, 12:40 am

ruveyn wrote:
If a nuclear fission station is over-designed about 10:1 it is probably very safe. But over designing raises the cost of construction. Even so a safety margin is good to have. Look at what happened at Chernobyl. Some incompetent commissar was doing non-standard operations on a facility that does not have proper containment. There rest is history. There is an entire region around Prepiyat which is blighted and won't be livable by humans for at least another century.

Fukushima's reactor was built extremely well, but we can't control nature and she threw at us too much to handle. A few smaller links in the chain broke (the power grid leading to the plant, etc) causing the whole thing to fail spectacularly.

Even if it's safe 99.9% of the time, but that 0.1% chance is a planet-destroying event... is it worth the gamble?

The pollution from a nuke plant may be millions of times less in volume (thus easier to contain and store/hide) but it's many millions of times MORE TOXIC and longer-lasting.

Whether wood or uranium, I'd really like to see human progress beyond getting its energy from "burnin' stuff".



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25 Jan 2013, 1:45 am

If it wasnt for a bunch of laws that prohibit the building of new reactors with new technology then fission would be totally safe.
Or you know, had them use thorium reactors instead of uranium ones. Since the thorium ones produce a tad less power but are totally safe and clean.



ripped
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25 Jan 2013, 6:20 am

MXH wrote:
If it wasnt for a bunch of laws that prohibit the building of new reactors with new technology then fission would be totally safe.

But you cant stop a fission reactor without multiple systems being connected and working.
One earthquake and you've got an uncontrollable meltdown.

Or you know, had them use thorium reactors instead of uranium ones. Since the thorium ones produce a tad less power but are totally safe and clean.


But the nuclear industry has been telling the world the same thing about the old fission reactors, and most of them supposedly leak.

I found this by a journalist on youtube.
It doesn't get to the story until 7:21

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9ZYH-ys4P0[/youtube]



ruveyn
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25 Jan 2013, 10:52 am

The best you can say about the new fission reactor designs is: they are safer than the older designs. But, disasters are always possible, particularly if the management of a nuclear fission facility is careless, incompetent or dead from the neck up. When the suits are in charge, beware!

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ripped
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25 Jan 2013, 9:14 pm

ruveyn wrote:
The best you can say about the new fission reactor designs is: they are safer than the older designs. But, disasters are always possible, particularly if the management of a nuclear fission facility is careless, incompetent or dead from the neck up. When the suits are in charge, beware!

ruveyn


And the likelihood of this happening in India?



ruveyn
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25 Jan 2013, 9:52 pm

ripped wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
The best you can say about the new fission reactor designs is: they are safer than the older designs. But, disasters are always possible, particularly if the management of a nuclear fission facility is careless, incompetent or dead from the neck up. When the suits are in charge, beware!

ruveyn


And the likelihood of this happening in India?


Oh my goodness golly gosh. Very high. The high water mark of Indian engineering and science was during the Gupta dynasty 320 - 550 C.E.

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ripped
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25 Jan 2013, 11:02 pm

ruveyn wrote:
ripped wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
The best you can say about the new fission reactor designs is: they are safer than the older designs. But, disasters are always possible, particularly if the management of a nuclear fission facility is careless, incompetent or dead from the neck up. When the suits are in charge, beware!

ruveyn


And the likelihood of this happening in India?


Oh my goodness golly gosh. Very high. The high water mark of Indian engineering and science was during the Gupta dynasty 320 - 550 C.E.
ruveyn


I have heard similar of Indian standards of engineering elsewhere as well.



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26 Jan 2013, 3:24 pm

Here is a viable alternative that should be considered:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9M__yYbsZ4&feature=share&list=FLdDe8KfMti2UlAsIPMzd3ow[/youtube]


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ruveyn
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26 Jan 2013, 8:38 pm

richie wrote:
Here is a viable alternative that should be considered:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9M__yYbsZ4&feature=share&list=FLdDe8KfMti2UlAsIPMzd3ow[/youtube]


Thorium looks very promising. And it solves the problem of terrorists stealing waste material to make bombs. The waste from thorium can not be made into a nuclear explosive. And even better there is plenty of thorium to "burn".

Now, if we can shut up the eco-freaks and the hydrocarbon corporate interests for a while we may well get what we need.

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ripped
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27 Jan 2013, 1:49 am

ruveyn wrote:
richie wrote:
Here is a viable alternative that should be considered:
Thorium looks very promising. And it solves the problem of terrorists stealing waste material to make bombs. The waste from thorium can not be made into a nuclear explosive. And even better there is plenty of thorium to "burn".

Now, if we can shut up the eco-freaks and the hydrocarbon corporate interests for a while we may well get what we need.
ruveyn


There's nothing stopping the scientific community from building a test plant.



ruveyn
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27 Jan 2013, 6:02 am

ripped wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
richie wrote:
Here is a viable alternative that should be considered:
Thorium looks very promising. And it solves the problem of terrorists stealing waste material to make bombs. The waste from thorium can not be made into a nuclear explosive. And even better there is plenty of thorium to "burn".

Now, if we can shut up the eco-freaks and the hydrocarbon corporate interests for a while we may well get what we need.
ruveyn


There's nothing stopping the scientific community from building a test plant.


Wrong! It costs a lot of money and the "scientific community" has been sucking the Government Teat since the end of WW2.

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ripped
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28 Jan 2013, 7:29 pm

ruveyn wrote:
ripped wrote:
ruveyn wrote:
richie wrote:
Here is a viable alternative that should be considered:
Thorium looks very promising. And it solves the problem of terrorists stealing waste material to make bombs. The waste from thorium can not be made into a nuclear explosive. And even better there is plenty of thorium to "burn".


Now, if we can shut up the eco-freaks and the hydrocarbon corporate interests for a while we may well get what we need.
ruveyn


There's nothing stopping the scientific community from building a test plant.


Wrong! It costs a lot of money and the "scientific community" has been sucking the Government Teat since the end of WW2.

ruveyn

There are scientific communities in every country my friend.