#haleu — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #haleu, aggregated by home.social.
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Not to mention all the #WaterConsumption! There are plans to restart aging nuclear reactor as well as untested SMR reactors! Will #AI’s huge energy demands spur a #nuclear renaissance?
By Davide Castelvecchi
25 October 2024Do small modular reactors carry extra risks?
"In some cases, small modular reactors 'could actually push nuclear power in a more dangerous direction', says #EdwinLyman. 'Advanced isn’t always better.'
"In particular, Lyman points out that the pebble-bed designs drawn up by #XEnergy and #Kairos would rely on high-assay low-enriched #uranium (#HALEU), which comprises 10–20% uranium-235 — compared with the 5% enrichment level required by most existing reactors (and by #NuScale’s reactor). HALEU is still classified as low-enrichment fuel (as opposed to the highly enriched uranium used to make nuclear bombs), but that distinction is misleading, Lyman says. In June, he and his collaborators — including physicist Richard Garwin, who led the design of the first hydrogen bomb — warned in a Science article that a bomb could be built with a few hundred kilograms of HALEU, with no need for further enrichment.
"Smaller reactors are also likely to produce more nuclear waste and to use fuel less efficiently, according to work reported in 2022 by Macfarlane and her collaborators. In a full-size reactor, most of the neutrons produced by the splitting of uranium travel through a large volume of fuel, meaning that they have a high probability of hitting another nucleus, rather than colliding with the walls of the reactor vessel or escaping into the surrounding building. 'When you shrink the reactor, there’s less material in there, so you will have more neutron leakage,' Macfarlane says. These rogue neutrons can be absorbed by other atomic nuclei — which would then themselves become radioactive."
Original article:
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-03490-3Archived version:
https://archive.ph/mODpF#selection-952.0-991.164#AI #ArtificialIntelligence #Cryptocurrency #DataCenters #RethinkNotRestart #NoNukesForAI #NoNukes #NuclearHype #NeutronEmbrittlement #NuclearWaste #NotCarbonFree
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A small town in rural Ohio is producing #EnrichedUranium again. Here's why that matters
The Ohio Newsroom | By Erin Gottsacker
Published April 18, 2024"When Centrus Energy flipped three switches at its new plant last fall, it was a new beginning for an industry that had been dormant for more than a decade in #Ohio: #UraniumEnrichment.
"As the U.S. looks to meet its clean energy [sic] goals, there’s increasing demand for the resource, which is necessary for nuclear power generation.
"For years, the U.S. didn’t have a American-owned source of enriched uranium. (A subsidiary of #Urenco enriches #uranium in #NewMexico, but it's owned by a conglomeration of foreign governments and European-based businesses.) Now, #CentrusEnergy is attempting to fill in the gap. And it’s doing that at a plant in #PiketonOhio.
[...]
"Some locals aren’t thrilled. One group worries about the industry’s connection to #NuclearWeapons. Others fear the waste from the plant could #contaminate the surrounding #environment. The specter of the last time #uranium was being enriched in Piketon looms large: many former plant workers get federal compensation because of illnesses they sustained as a result of exposure to #toxic and #radioactive materials.
"'I feel violated,' said Vina Colley, a former worker at the #PortsmouthGaseousDiffusionPlant. 'They said I would get more radiation by getting on the plane than working out here.'
"In the time since she worked at the plant, she’s battled #beryllium disease, #ChronicBronchitis, #COPD, #neuropathy and #HeartFailure."
#NoUraniumEnrichment #RadioactiveContamination #NewNuclear #Uranium #HALEU #UF6
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> U.S. Reenters the #NuclearFuel Game
> #HALEU is needed instead for reactors with more creative coolants and fuels, which are trying to achieve very compact core sizes. These include #Bellevue, #Washington–based #TerraPower’s #sodiumCooled #fastReactor, #Rockville, #Maryland –based #Xenergy’s #highTemperature gas reactor, and #Alameda, #California–based #KairosPower’s #fluoride-salt-cooled high-temperature #reactor.