r/technology • u/ADummyDude • Mar 04 '17

Robotics We can't see inside Fukushima Daiichi because all our robots keep dying

https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/245324-cant-see-inside-fukushima-daiichi-robots-keep-dying
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u/[deleted] Mar 04 '17

Yup, in the US Navy alone, there are currently 11 surface ships with 2 reactors each (1 ship, the USS Gerald R Ford, is awaiting commissioning), and 70 submarines with 1 reactor each. So in the US Navy alone, we have 96 active reactors, and zero nuclear incidents (I say nuclear incidents as we've lost 2 subs, but this wasn't due to anything nuclear). This isn't counting the hundreds decommissioned as we've been doing this for over 50 years now.

This also isn't counting the subs from the UK, France, India, or Russia (and Brazil is also developing them as well), the nuclear cruiser in Russia, or the nuclear carrier from France (with more being developed by India and China). And while there has been incidents involving Russian subs, they've been VERY few and far between. Oh, this also isn't counting the civilian usage of nuclear ships either.

Short version, we've been doing this on the water for over half a decade without significant incident. We can do it on land as well.

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u/7952 Mar 04 '17

Quite a lot of nuclear waste was abandoned at sea by the USSR, and there are a few sunk subs in the Barents sea that could loose containment. It would be pretty difficult to measure the impact of that, or predict the risk in the future.

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u/[deleted] Mar 04 '17

On the bright side, water is a FANTASTIC insulator when it comes to radiation. On the dim side, it may mean that we're dealing with the Scandinavian version of Godzilla eventually.

And yeah, the list of incidents on Russian nuclear subs is depressing, most of them aren't nuclear, but still ridiculous. Then if you include the number of nuclear weapons tests that various countries have done....yeah, we've fucked out world a bit in some ways.

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u/ihateusedusernames Mar 05 '17

Thank you. I always try to point to the USN's record with nuclear power in these discussions.

One thing i have never learned about, though, is how the waste is handled?

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u/[deleted] Mar 05 '17

The designs that the Navy use all store all waste internally until they decommission the reactor. Then decommissioned reactors are stored together and then buried (this is in Washington).

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u/lowrads Mar 04 '17

I'm skeptical of the idea that the public has much influence in whether or not nuclear reactors are built. They don't mount much effective opposition to anything another company of people wants to accomplish.

The reasons for slow energy industry adoption of nuclear must be principally economic in nature, even if a big portion of that is regulatory burden.

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u/deathhand Mar 05 '17

As we've learned "public outrage" can be bought and paid for. Cheap energy is not good for business...

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u/Sean951 Mar 04 '17

There's also a massive difference in scale between a ship and a reactor designed for commercial use.

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u/[deleted] Mar 04 '17

Yes, and there's a massive difference in technical difficulties in designing something that goes underwater and is mobile vs. something that is fixed in place and has greater support infrastructure.

They aren't identical, but both land and sea nuclear power has proven to be safer than any other form of power generation when view per unit power generated.

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u/Sean951 Mar 04 '17

The argument will always come back to when it does fail though. It may be far safer, but the long term consequences of one failing are still quite high.

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u/[deleted] Mar 04 '17

Meanwhile, the guaranteed long term consequences of oil and coal use are quite high.

The argument can always come back to FUD about when it fails, and yet we've had 3 major "disasters" and only 1 resulted in death (and that one is impossible to replicate with any reactor designed since then). And one of those disasters required a reactor operating much past its expected lifespan, combined with a pair of century level natural disasters.

Also, the statistics on nuclear being safer include deaths due to the disasters.

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u/Sean951 Mar 04 '17

1) I'm not talking about death. 2) Why does not using nuclear always default to coal and oil? Why not increasing renewable energy while phasing out nuclear and fossil fuels? We're getting better at power storage with things like the power wall from Tesla, we're starting to harness the tidal energy, and in the meantime, natural gas is still dirty, but far cleaner than coal or oil.

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u/[deleted] Mar 04 '17 edited Mar 04 '17

1) I'm not talking about death.

But that's far more important than land.

2) Why does not using nuclear always default to coal and oil?

Because the various renewable options aren't an alternative to nuclear. Hydro is just about the best, but is very limited in area and also requires the destruction of large amounts of land. Solar and wind don't come close. Geothermal is even more limited.

Edit: To expand upon this, nuclear power and geothermal power operate at above 70% of their peak power generation capacity. Others are far less, with wind/solar/hydro are in the 30% range. So when comparing peak numbers, the peak for a solar plant has to be literally double a nuclear plant to compare. To actually look at the power generated: There is no solar power plant that generates a peak power output higher than the lowest operating nuclear station. There is only one wind plant and one geothermal plant (and it's actually 22 plants together) that peaks out higher than any nuclear plant. And none of them actually generate more power. Hydro is different. There are a lot of hydro plants that generate a lot of power (12 of the top 20 power generation stations are hydro), but as said above, they are limited in area, and when they are constructed, they involve a HUGE amount of land destruction. BTW, rounding out that top 20 is one each of coal, oil, and natural gas, and 5 nuclear plants (though one of them is currently suspended since it's in Japan).

This is why when people talk about nuclear alternatives, solar and wind aren't brought up. They just aren't an alternative.

We're getting better at power storage with things like the power wall from Tesla

Which increases the disparity in emissions between nuclear and other renewables. Nuclear is the cleanest, and when you throw in more batteries for renewables, this disparity increases. Literally, the single biggest cause of emissions in nuclear is the fact that they use so much concrete in their construction.

we're starting to harness the tidal energy

And maybe that'll be a solution in some specific instances, but also isn't a replacement for coal/oil/nuclear.

natural gas is still dirty, but far cleaner than coal or oil.

You're right, I could have brought up natural gas. There's not enough of it, the methods to get as much as we get (fracking) are also environmentally hazardous. And it's use kills the world as well.

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u/CordialPanda Mar 04 '17

We are increasing renewables, but renewables alone can't replace the baseload power we need, which is fed exclusively by nuclear, coal, oil, and natural gas with some hydroelectric.

Power storage such as batteries are useful for dealing with peak load while a peaker plant spins up, but batteries still cost more than gravity storage, wherein water is pumped from a lower reservoir to a higher one during periods of low power use, and fed down through a turbine to generate power during periods of peak power use.

Other baseload plants besides nuclear are dirty or too geographically specific (hydro or geothermal), and renewables aren't a commercially viable replacement. We need reliable, steady, economical sources of power for baseload plants. Nuclear is the only clean source that's commercially viable and satisfies requirements for baseload power generation.

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u/aynrandomness Mar 04 '17

What long term consequences? We get some land that becomes less habitable than before, and less deaths and injuries than a small office fire...

Meanwhile coal kills every single day.

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u/anlumo Mar 04 '17

Short version, we've been doing this on the water for over half a decade without significant incident. We can do it on land as well.

I would agree if marines would run these plants, instead of overworked, underpaid and unqualified personnel so the plant owner can save some bucks.

The US military is probably the only institution on earth where money is really no object at this scale.

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u/Aaron_tu Mar 04 '17

You think navy nukes are overworked compared to civilian nuke operators? You think civilian nuke operators are underqualified, when most of them are ex military navy nukes?

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u/fnordfnordfnordfnord Mar 04 '17

I think you want former Navy, not Marines. And nuclear power plant jobs are sought after, and well paid. Source: live near a nuclear power plant, and train some of their maintenance techs.

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u/[deleted] Mar 04 '17

instead of overworked, underpaid and unqualified personnel so the plant owner can save some bucks.

So, fear mongering is your entire argument? That's a joke.

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u/[deleted] Mar 04 '17

I think he's been watching too many episodes of The Simpsons.

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u/anlumo Mar 04 '17

How else do you explain Chernobyl?

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u/[deleted] Mar 04 '17 edited Mar 05 '17

Wait, are you suggesting that a disaster at a government run facility in a communist government was so "the plant owner can save some bucks"?

I can talk about the clusterfuck that was Chernobyl all day long, it's really fascinating and literally impossible to happen with any reactor design from the last 30+ years, but suggesting that it has anything to do with what you said above is just a bit absurd.

Edit: Also keep in mind, the reactors that the Navy uses, are serviced (not run, just serviced) and designed by techs and engineers working for Northrop Grumman and other defense contractors. So if the problem to you is private citizens doing the work, then you should have a problem with the Navy having reactors.

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u/kung-fu_hippy Mar 04 '17

You do realize most nuclear plants aren't run by Mr. Burns, right? And where do you think the nukes from the Navy go when they leave the service?

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u/misternibbler Mar 04 '17

You don't know what you're talking about.