The US wants to build a different kind of nuclear reactor from a decades-old concept that could power ships and other off-the-grid locations
www.businessinsider.com
Most nuclear reactors use water as a coolant. Molten salt reactors use salts with higher boiling points. Kairos Power will build the US's first in decades.

One study suggested that the reactors could produce more nuclear waste than current systems and that they “will use highly corrosive and pyrophoric fuels and coolants that, following irradiation, will become highly radioactive.”

  • 🐑🇸 🇭 🇪 🇪 🇵 🇱 🇪🐑@lemmy.worldEnglish
    469·
    11 months ago

    Molten Salt reactors are great at recycling spent uranium and don’t really cause pollution. If anything they reduce pollution because they create less nuclear garbage.

    Over here in Germany it has already shown that you can’t fully replace nuclear power with green power. What you instead get if you try to shut down all the nuclear reactors is an increase in coal fossil fuel based plants, which are far worse for the environment

    So, do you want nuclear power and have us learn how to recycle nuclear waste, or do you want to abolish nuclear power and have us return to fossil fuels? These are your only two options.

    • roguetrick@kbin.social
      41·
      11 months ago

      Molten Salt reactors are great at recycling spent uranium and don’t really cause pollution. If anything they reduce pollution because they create less nuclear garbage.

      If it was that big of a problem folks would be doing PUREX reprocessing with all nuclear fuel. Not a clean process, but reduces the overall mass problem you have with spent fuel rods. No matter what you do, you just can’t burn off the fission products that last forever and ever. You can put them in a container the size of a coffee can that still emits a similar amount of radiation as a whole rod if you want, but I’m not sure I see the utility. They just take those and vitrify them to make them bigger to take advantage of the inverse square law and make them safer to handle.

      As long as uranium stays cheap, neither reprocessing, breeders, or reactors that eat the plutonium they produce really makes sense. You still need a similar site to store the waste regardless. As it stands I don’t think we’ll see uranium being a significant part of running a reactor in the foreseeable future. (As long as you’re not a nuclear weapons state that doesn’t have a robust fuel enrichment program, like India).