Hi, I just found your Substack via Robert Bryce's essay Solar Energy Is Getting 200 Times More In… and your comment there.
Is there a "Pick up" to your story for HS kids since 8/21/23 that is displayed on your Substack web site? I don't happen to see one. If you were presenting Power Point slides somewhere, I have missed those, too. Or did you convert slide bullets to prose text?
But, really, as a retired engineer what I would like to find about nuclear energy is an essay, book, pamphlet, or whatever that describes the 8 to 16 different types or kinds of nuclear power plants/ sources (liquid water reactors, molten salt reactors, etc.), their respective pros and cons, and that helps to sort out the wide mix of abbreviations used for them. I am looking for something at a level suitable for a technically educated layman without being a dissertation into all aspects of nuclear chemistry, etc. I have seen several You Tube videos addressing thorium molten salt reactors that seem to be the best thing nuclear since sliced bread, but as a materials engineer I am interested in learning more about the kinds of materials used for valves, heat exchange tubing, etc. ; as well as more general trade-off issues of size, cost, storage or related legal issues, etc.
No hurry on a reply, but I presume Substack will send me an email alert if/when you do post a response. [true??]
There ought to be a way within Substack's business model to pay writers smaller amounts (say $10/year) when they are submitting less frequent content. Then you have to make up your "income" from volume of readers more than volume of submittals. Just a minor sore point, as it appears Substack is a resource with way more enticing content (from a variety of knowledgeable writers across many disciplines) than anyone can profitably consume. But I don't want to subscribe to 20 writers at $80/year, in part because I won't have the time to fully read everything they might put out.
PS: while I did my 19 months and 4 days as an Army inductee, thank you for your service in the Navy.
Hey -- Thanks for subscribing. I just changed the name to The Truth is Out There, so be on the lookout for that. My nuclear power presentation started out as a Power Point presentation, but there is a lot more information that needs to be presented than can be addressed in the bullet points of a slide and a short talk. So it evolved into what you see on Substack. I included photos and cartoons to help explain things. If you scroll back to Part I, you can read it all. I have one more posting to go. My hope is that I've kept it simple enough that most everyone can gain a good understanding of nuclear power from what I've written. In the U.S. all our current reactors are either Pressurized Water Reactors (PWR) or Boiling Water Reactors (BWR). In a BWR the cooling water boils to become steam which drives the turbine. (One fewer loops to worry about.). But BWRs contaminate the turbine with radioactivity, which PWRs don't do. Both use light or normal water as the coolant and moderator. The Canadians have a different design which uses "heavy water," or deuterium oxide as the coolant and moderator. But PWRs and BWRs are dominant. I think it's probably wise to stick with those two proven technologies. Thorium reactors are interesting, and we ought to pursue that technology -- but NRC will not license them in our lifetime, and the technology is going nowhere any where in the world. Another alternative that is a bit more likely to succeed is Small Modular Reactors (SMRs). Several serious companies are working on SMRs, including NuScale, which has obtained NRC approval of its design. But so far there are no customers. The NuScale SMR is a light water reactor running on Uranium in a compact design producing 50-300 megawatts. In the main, Nuclear Power supplies baseload power for the grid, which means they need to be big -- more than 1,000 megawatts. I think it's wise, at this point in history, to stick with proven technology -- PWRs and BWRs -- which can be built in large numbers everywhere people are willing. My next posting will address Barakah in the U.A. E. The Emirates built four 1,400 megawatt units of South Korean design for $24.4 billion. Units 3 & 4 at Plant Vogtle in Georgia, just completed, are 1,100 megawatt plants that cost more than $30 billion. The U.S. can do better.
Good job. Thank you for your service in the navy and at NRC.
Thanks Shawn -- Nuclear power is much misunderstood, and I hope I have helped clear it up for my readers.
Hi, I just found your Substack via Robert Bryce's essay Solar Energy Is Getting 200 Times More In… and your comment there.
Is there a "Pick up" to your story for HS kids since 8/21/23 that is displayed on your Substack web site? I don't happen to see one. If you were presenting Power Point slides somewhere, I have missed those, too. Or did you convert slide bullets to prose text?
But, really, as a retired engineer what I would like to find about nuclear energy is an essay, book, pamphlet, or whatever that describes the 8 to 16 different types or kinds of nuclear power plants/ sources (liquid water reactors, molten salt reactors, etc.), their respective pros and cons, and that helps to sort out the wide mix of abbreviations used for them. I am looking for something at a level suitable for a technically educated layman without being a dissertation into all aspects of nuclear chemistry, etc. I have seen several You Tube videos addressing thorium molten salt reactors that seem to be the best thing nuclear since sliced bread, but as a materials engineer I am interested in learning more about the kinds of materials used for valves, heat exchange tubing, etc. ; as well as more general trade-off issues of size, cost, storage or related legal issues, etc.
No hurry on a reply, but I presume Substack will send me an email alert if/when you do post a response. [true??]
There ought to be a way within Substack's business model to pay writers smaller amounts (say $10/year) when they are submitting less frequent content. Then you have to make up your "income" from volume of readers more than volume of submittals. Just a minor sore point, as it appears Substack is a resource with way more enticing content (from a variety of knowledgeable writers across many disciplines) than anyone can profitably consume. But I don't want to subscribe to 20 writers at $80/year, in part because I won't have the time to fully read everything they might put out.
PS: while I did my 19 months and 4 days as an Army inductee, thank you for your service in the Navy.
Hey -- Thanks for subscribing. I just changed the name to The Truth is Out There, so be on the lookout for that. My nuclear power presentation started out as a Power Point presentation, but there is a lot more information that needs to be presented than can be addressed in the bullet points of a slide and a short talk. So it evolved into what you see on Substack. I included photos and cartoons to help explain things. If you scroll back to Part I, you can read it all. I have one more posting to go. My hope is that I've kept it simple enough that most everyone can gain a good understanding of nuclear power from what I've written. In the U.S. all our current reactors are either Pressurized Water Reactors (PWR) or Boiling Water Reactors (BWR). In a BWR the cooling water boils to become steam which drives the turbine. (One fewer loops to worry about.). But BWRs contaminate the turbine with radioactivity, which PWRs don't do. Both use light or normal water as the coolant and moderator. The Canadians have a different design which uses "heavy water," or deuterium oxide as the coolant and moderator. But PWRs and BWRs are dominant. I think it's probably wise to stick with those two proven technologies. Thorium reactors are interesting, and we ought to pursue that technology -- but NRC will not license them in our lifetime, and the technology is going nowhere any where in the world. Another alternative that is a bit more likely to succeed is Small Modular Reactors (SMRs). Several serious companies are working on SMRs, including NuScale, which has obtained NRC approval of its design. But so far there are no customers. The NuScale SMR is a light water reactor running on Uranium in a compact design producing 50-300 megawatts. In the main, Nuclear Power supplies baseload power for the grid, which means they need to be big -- more than 1,000 megawatts. I think it's wise, at this point in history, to stick with proven technology -- PWRs and BWRs -- which can be built in large numbers everywhere people are willing. My next posting will address Barakah in the U.A. E. The Emirates built four 1,400 megawatt units of South Korean design for $24.4 billion. Units 3 & 4 at Plant Vogtle in Georgia, just completed, are 1,100 megawatt plants that cost more than $30 billion. The U.S. can do better.
Ok, the Substack name change explains why I did not see any of your other postings.
I won't get through them all any time soon, but will try to explore them as time permits.
Thanks, again.
Breck: You might want to recommend your readers read the GreenNUKE substack. https://greennuke.substack.com/