r/nuclear

I find the idea interesting, since if I understand correctly, you can just move the nuclear plant to any coast you'd like. With that in mind, I wonder three things:

1. If floating nuclear plants can be made in an automated coastal factory, say if we built one adjacent to the Newport News VA shipyard, have robots manufacture the entire floating building, and tow it to the customer. EDIT: This has been pointed out as outlandish. So rather than "100% automated", I'll say 'automated to the extent that we know how to'.
2. If so, can the floating plants be made so cheaply due to that automated method that they outperform traditional plants on cost?
3. If a floating plant has different requirements than a plant on land, and thus perhaps the reactor can be made with either larger reactors than on land, or rendering some safety systems unnecessary.

I know a lot of people here are skeptical about the pilot program and the goal of criticality by July 4th, but this represents some real momentum within the industry. It’s easy to trivialize zero power criticality as just putting a bunch of fuel in a bucket and saying mission accomplished, but the fact that so many of these companies have struggled to accomplish even that shows that it’s not as simple as it sounds. I think the speed at which Antares, Deployable, and especially Valar have been moving is really impressive since it feels like everything else in the advanced reactor space has been painfully slow. Valar doing a zero power test, a full power test, safety demonstration, and even generating a small amount of electricity within the span of a few weeks is unheard of and is a hell of a lot more than putting fuel in a bucket. One of the most impressive things for me though was that I had hardly heard of these companies until they went critical yet they blew the companies that everyone talks about out of the water.

One of those companies that I heard about constantly was Aalo. When the July 4th target was announced, I thought that they would be the first to meet it because they committed to it so hard. It feels like every day I would see them make a LinkedIn post about it or talk about it on their podcast. They even added a countdown timer to July 4th on their website. Then the deadline started actually approaching. Antares went critical, then Valar, then Deployable, and still just talk from Aalo. I thought maybe they were intentionally waiting until the 4th as a marketing stunt. They were still talking about loading the fuel and working around the clock to hit the deadline up until Friday, then nothing. They’ll probably go critical soon, maybe even tomorrow, but all that just to not hit the one deadline they haven’t shut up about for a year is just kind of embarrassing.

Another one that’s constantly getting attention for seemingly no reason is Oklo. They had not one, not two, but three chances since they were the only company that entered multiple reactors into the pilot program: Pluto, Aurora, and Groves (which is actually under Atomic Alchemy but Oklo claims it since they acquired them last year ). Granted, Pluto and Aurora were never supposed to hit the July 4th deadline as far as I can tell, but it strikes me as weird to enter several reactors into the program when you can barely handle one. Groves, however, was scheduled to go critical by the 4th, and they wouldn’t let us forget it. Just like Aalo lots of talk about the deadline, and also a lot of weird bragging about how they built a reactor building. Idk if I’m missing something, but that’s just … not impressive? About a week ago, they quietly moved their target to the end of July instead when it was abundantly clear they weren’t going to make it. Given their track record, I’m not even sure I believe their July deadline.

All that to say, I think we really need to separate the wheat from the chaff as an industry. We have some remarkable companies that are rightfully receiving a lot of credit for their efforts.
I’m worried that the credit won’t mean too much though when it feels like everyone gets a participation trophy and all the broken promises are forgotten. A lot of us are understandably hesitant to criticize since nuclear is such a small world. I personally know people at both Aalo and Oklo who are good people and good engineers, but you can have a million good engineers and still get nothing done if the culture and leadership at a company focuses more on hype than progress. It’s time we start holding people more accountable when they make promises like this because it doesn’t just damage their credibility, but the credibility of the industry as a whole. It also distracts from the real progress that’s being made. Only a few of these companies can succeed, so if everyone and their grandma is coming out with their own startup and circlejerking about their paper reactors, nothing is ever going to get done. If we want to turn this momentum into actual power on the grid then we have to focus on the doers and move on from the talkers. Curious to hear what yall think.

Geography and security clearance carried more weight than the science for decades. With Valar operating outside Idaho, the question stops being theoretical.

Three candidates for which lab function stops being a moat first: fuel qualification (because hot cells and fuel concentration aren't permanent), safety analysis review (where institutional memory still matters), and operator training (where simulators are sticky). Curious which one this sub thinks falls first, and on what timeline.

Hello, and I apologize if this post is inappropriate. I am about 28 credits from graduating with a BSNT with a concentration in Cybersecurity with the classes left mostly having to do with the Cybersecurity portion and I feel like I know almost nothing. I have some level of understanding obviously but I feel completely incompetent if I was asked to do a job. I have no actual work experience. My question is the same as the title, what would I be expected to know as a new hire, completely inexperienced in the field? Are there topics I should be particularly touching up on?

Edit: Its actually a BS in nuclear engineering technology not just nuclear technology which is probably a meaningful distinction.

What makes a fast reactor work without moderator? Is there simply more fuel to compensate or is it because U238 is better at capturing fast neutrons and becomes Pu239 so the fuel is self enriching to higher fissile concetrations?

Preferably with numbers like how many barns each isotopes have for fast and thermal neutrons followed by how the isotopes transforms inside the process.

I hadn't heard of Steady Energy before - interesting concept to build a 50 MWth reactor that produces only low pressure 150C steam for district heating, not electricity.

With all the activity in America its great to see other countries get in the game, especially the Scandinavian countries leaning in to their heritage of excellent nuclear engineering.