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[Reelya]

But that's still the point. Sure there are some examples of working ones, but if it was really viable then Russia and China would be full of those things, not just some example reactors here and there. After all, they have working designs they could roll out already, so why aren't they?

Really, my point here is that the idea that NIMBYS stopped this technology being rolled out in every nuclear-capable nation is quite implausible.

[Maximum Spin]

But that's still the point. Sure there are some examples of working ones, but if it was really viable then Russia and China would be full of those things, not just some example reactors here and there. After all, they have working designs they could roll out already, so why aren't they?

Because they have fuckloads of fossil fuels and don't care about the environment.

[Reelya]

That doesn't quite fly. China is the largest oil and (second largest) coal importer in the world. While they might not care about the environment, they do care about spending money.

But that still doesn't answer the question. Breeder reactors failed, globally and (not) just in any specific country, so in all the countries. The given explanation is not sufficient to explain that. Clearly the whole deal isn't as good as suggested, or somebody somewhere would be building a bunch of them to capitalize on everyone else not doing it.

So, they build thousands of other types of reactors and 10000 nuclear bombs worldwide, but this specific type of reactor, it's the greenies fault that they couldn't bootstrap an industry out of it? Seems implausible to say the least.

Here's an overview of the history. None of the failure in any of the nations seems to be because of protests or anything, rather it was because the price of uranium was too low to make the breeder reactors economically viable. So, it looks like they only become economic at a higher price than regular fission reactors? That would make logical sense as to why they actually failed, and would suggest thati if we go that route now, then it's going to be high-cost. It'd also take a long time to produce good reactor designs. A lot goes into making sure something like that doesn't fuck up.

[Maximum Spin]

That doesn't quite fly. China is the largest oil and (second largest) coal importer in the world. While they might not care about the environment, they do care about spending money.

But that still doesn't answer the question. Breeder reactors failed, globally and (not) just in any specific country, so in all the countries. The given explanation is not sufficient to explain that. Clearly the whole deal isn't as good as suggested, or somebody somewhere would be building a bunch of them to capitalize on everyone else not doing it.

Again, it's not a better deal, in the short term, than fossil fuels. That's the whole point and whole problem. There isn't a need for any more explanation than that.

[Reelya]

It's also not a better deal that normal fission reactors, which is why all the various breeder reactor projects were canned in the first place (the real reason).

https://static.sys.kth.se/itm/wp/cesis/cesiswp186.pdf

So that's kind of the point. You say that they weren't as good a deal as fossil fuels so they didn't get built. but fission reactors did, so explain that? By that logic, they're also not as good a deal as the fission reactors, so they're not all they're clocked to be as a replacement for those reactors either. Or we'd already have replaced them, obviously.

[Maximum Spin]

It's also not a better deal that normal fission reactors, which is why all the various breeder reactor projects were canned in the first place (the real reason).

https://static.sys.kth.se/itm/wp/cesis/cesiswp186.pdf

It is when you start running out of easily-mined uranium...
You're being exactly like the industry experts who said that fracking would never take off because it's just not economical. What is or isn't economical changes.

[Reelya]

If you start running out of easily mined uranium then the cost goes up making nuclear more expensive, that's when the breeders become cost-effective, but only compared to the now-too-expensive fission reactors. not compared to everything else.

It's like if there was a type of bread that costs $8 a loaf to make, and you're holding out for the day that there's a wheat shortage and regular bread goes up to $10 a loaf, then everyone will start buying your $8 bread. Except everyone buys rice and potatoes instead.

Let's face it, if the price of uranium goes up enough to make these exotic reactors viable then now literally every other option is far more competitive so they still won't do that.

EDIT: this all goes back to my original point. the reason these things failed always goes back to the underlying economics not working out. NIMBYS and shit is just that, pure horseshit designed to shift the blame. Follow the money, and breeder reactors were looking to be more expensive than normal nuclear, not less expensive, so they got axed. They're only actually viable if literally every other energy source becomes more expensive at the same time compared to breeder reactors, not just if normal uranium reactors do.

[Maximum Spin]

It's like if there was a type of bread that costs $8 a loaf to make, and you're holding out for the day that there's a wheat shortage and regular bread goes up to $10 a loaf, then everyone will start buying your $8 bread. Except everyone buys rice and potatoes instead.

In this metaphor, rice and potatos are fossil fuels. I have already agreed that fossil fuels are more cost-effective than nuclear power, which is exactly why we have the problem that we do. I'm not even sure what position you're supposed to be arguing at this point. If you want to stick with fossil fuels forever... well, there'll be a shortage of rice and potatos one day too.

[Reelya]

rice and potatoes are fossil fuels but also solar, hydro wind and geothermal in that example however.

The point is that breeder reactors didn't work the first time, so bringing them up as some sort of solution isn't a viable argument. I'm arguing them because you brought them up. You're bringing up ideas that have already, and are clearly documented, to be failed ideas. At least if you said thorium reactors that's an idea that hasn't failed (yet) even if there's no evidence that they're going to be viable in a short enough term to deal with global warming.

It wasn't nimbys or protestors, they failed in over a dozen different countries because they just didn't work out as an idea. The cost of energy would need to be through the roof for those things to become an option that people start to take seriously, and in that case, energy use would already start declining sharply meaning that expanding options wouldn't even be on the table.

If the price got high enough for breeder reactors, well that exceeds the cost of residential rooftop solar, and like i mentioned already, rooftops are underutilized "land area". so in that scenario you'd just stick solar panels on things rather than even bothering with a breeder reactor,.

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[wierd]

The real issue with hydrogen though, is that you can't safely contain it under pressure.  It is so GODDAMN SMALL, that it wiggles its way through the molecules of any container!!   Metal container? Hydrogen embrittlement-- the hydrogen wiggles through the teeny tiny gaps in the crystal boundaries of the metal, and it slowly gets forced apart, until BOOM.  Hydrocarbon based container? The gaps between the tangled mess of polymer chains is "EFFING HUGE" compared to a hydrogen atom, and it just slowly diffuses its way out of the container.  Etc.

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[Rolan7]

Just store it in oxygen, you even get free energy from the conversion!  ...wait

[wierd]

Nopey nope. That's either "brown gas", or water, depending on its entropy state.


Water is containable because it has a strong dipole moment, which prevents uniform diffusion, and it has a large molecular size, which prevents embrittlement based escape.  Brown gas is just a stoichiometric mix of hydrogen and oxygen, and the hydrogen in the container is unbound; It will still wriggle its way through the walls of the container, and the stoichiometric ratio of the mixture will thus change over time as that hydrogen outgasses. (assuming you dont detonate it.)