Excellent article - Obama and Dire Global Warming

[FL_Prius_Driver]

Originally Posted by tochatihu

China plans to purchase and install a large number of AP1000s from Westinghouse - 10 or possibly many more over the next decade? This is quite a safe design, as such things go, with passive rather than active emergency core cooling.

Apparently China also plans to make a (large) number of pebble bed reactors that can use the thorium cycle, but I do not see the definite plans on paper.

Any knowledge of how they plan to handle the waste?

[tripp]

PBRs (Pabst Blue Ribbon!) can store their waste onsite, I believe. What little I've read about them suggests that the "pebbles" can be stored in the ground and aren't particularly nasty. It's also a quite stable design and some have proposed smaller reactor plants instead of the large 1GW+ facilities that are typical now.

[tripp]

Originally Posted by tochatihu

The other nations with large building plans are Russia and India. Russia will make their own (of course) and I don't know what india plans.

Lets hope the Russians aren't planning any more graphite moderated plants.

[jayman]

Originally Posted by tripp

Jayman knows something about that design, perhaps he can comment on the thorium by products. Jayman?

Ok, I just got back today.

This is a long, technical brief on using CANDU for reprocessing and thorium cycles

The Evolution of CANDU Fuel Cycles and Their Potential Contribution to World Peace

The Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility has an older, but also highly technical article

AECL Seminar ~ A Plutonium/Thorium Economy in Canada

Apparently, the byproducts are - net - much lower due to reprocessing and reburn. Using up weapons grade plutonium is also highly desirable

The nice thing about CANDU is that it's relatively safe, and is a highly efficient breeder reactor

[TonyPSchaefer]

Originally Posted by FL_Prius_Driver

Any knowledge of how they plan to handle the waste?

Oh I think we'll be seeing that stuff eventually.

[jayman]

Originally Posted by tripp

Lets hope the Russians aren't planning any more graphite moderated plants.

Well, it *almost* worked. At least up until the moment it went KABOOM

[CarolinaJim]

Thank goodness Russia is a large country...apparently only a 30Km radius is needed for an exclusion zone.

[Sacto1549]

Originally Posted by jayman

Well, it *almost* worked. At least up until the moment it went KABOOM

Well, the biggest problem with Chernobyl was this: no containment structure. At least with the Three Mile Island partial core meltdown only a very small amount of radioactive particles were released, unlike the Chernobyl radiation release (which was akin to fallout from an atmospheric nuclear bomb test).

Besides, today's newest reactor designs are extremely safe, especially now with the application of passive cooling so even if the coolant supply is cut off the reactor can be quickly shut down safely.

[jayman]

A lot of the reactors used at Hanford had minimal containment too. I guess we were lucky not to have a major accident.

The former USSR had decades of sloppy oversight, sinister disregard for the civillian population, and accidents that remained hushed up for decades

It is widely regarded that Chelyabinsk is one of the most radioactive places on the planet

CHELYABINSK "The Most Contaminated Spot on the Planet" - a documentary film by Slawomir Grunberg - Log In Productions - distributed by LogTV LTD.

One of their worst accidents was an explosion at an underground waste storage tank, when the cooling system quit working. Overall, 3-4 times the radiation released by Chernobyl

With a track record like that, a sinister and callous disregard for the civillian population that was somewhat mirrored here in North America, one shouldn't be surprised at the healthy skeptical attitude towards the Peaceful Atom

[jayman]

Originally Posted by TonyPSchaefer

Oh I think we'll be seeing that stuff eventually.

Cute. I'm hoping the toys have very high lead content too