"Inherently safe reactors" is a term applied to nuclear reac-tors, usually of comparatively low power, which cannot have a meltdown because their power density is so low that the temperature of the moderator simply cannot rise high enough to melt the fuel rods, and because their reactivity is strongly nega-tive
¾any spurious fluctuation of power is immediately and automatically counteracted to restore the fluctuating value to its previous equilibrium. (The Chernobyl reactor had positive reactivity, and all of the many Soviet graphite reactors still do.)These reactors are nothing new, and I reported on them in April and May 1981: the leaders in the field are Canada with its SLOWPOKE reactor and Sweden, which has developed such a reactor for district heating. Since then, General Atomic of San Diego has developed the "modular high-temperature gas reac-tor" (MHTGR), which is also in this group, although the larger, "regular" HTGR is by any definition inherently safe: there is no way the carbon moderator can be brought up to its melting point and the highly efficient HTGR also has other virtues. (The HTGR reactor in Ft. St. Vrain, Colo., proved a great disap-pointment, mainly due to the high unreliability of its helium pumps
¾but that had nothing to do with the essence of the reactor.)None of this is new. What is new is the idea that the introduc-tion of these reactors could make the public embrace nuclear power, now that the sham-environmentalists have talked them-selves into a corner with their greenhouse hunches and scares.
That idea is absurd. Present reactors are already inherently safe; a meltdown is not only an extremely remote possibility, but if one does happen, as it has happened in several smaller reac-tors and partly at TMI (without loss of life, in the past), that is not the end of countermeasures. And all Western reactors have built-in negative reactivity.
But more important, can you imagine Ralph Nader or Tom Brokaw accepting any reactor at all? If you put it 1,000 ft under-ground they will ask for 5,000; if you make it 5,000, they will ask for 50,000. Inherently safe reactors will make them jubilate over the "admission" that nuclear power has been declared "unsafe," or it would not be necessary to introduce "safe" reactors, etc.
¾ for their agenda is not safety, but de-industrialization.That does not mean that a good thing should be rejected simply because of what the Luddites might say. It is surely desirable to make nuclear power even safer than it is now, and beyond that, the idea of smaller units with the resulting decentralization has advantages that may well outweigh the loss of some economy of size.
But all that can be done quietly, without the delusion, and above all without the PR noise, that this will result in "public acceptance" of nuclear power, as though public acceptance were not the result of the systematic misinformation and fear monger-ing of the mass media's great brainwash machine.
For once, glory be, the nuclear industry flacks have not fallen into this trap. But they still have not realized the merits of moral force in persuading people. They still cover up the great secret that nuclear power is safer and environmentally more benign than the power sources we use now. They are still afraid of offending the mostly coal-burning utilities, their best customers.
Let me give an analogy of what moral force can do. Bush's coercive $9 billion anti-drug maneuvers will have the same effect as previous such attempts
¾none. Mass drug use will continue until drug addicts are universally considered contemptible, and only then will it stop (as it did in the US at the end of the last century). But Bush's attitude is to "help" the druggies. Does he want to "help" the drunk drivers? the child molesters? the ped-dlers of military secrets? Moral peer pressure affects people more than fear of prison¾that's why drunk driving is receding and why Communism is collapsing.Quite similarly, people will accept nuclear power when they discover, because the mass media admit it, that it is more benign for safety, health and environment than any other source of electricity. They will accept it for moral reasons, and will remain unswayed by dollar costs, the dangers of foreign oil, and other arguments that have proved futile in the past.
But until then, do not fall for the delusion that "inherently safe reactors" will change their minds. Whether promoted by saboteurs like the Union of "Concerned" "Scientists" or by well-meaning scholars like Dr. Lidsky of MIT, it remains a delusion; and the de-industrializers don't care about the reasons for which they are given this extra help.
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Vol. 17, No. 2
Newsletter: Access to Energy Newsletter Archive Volume: Issues Issue/No.: Vol. 17, No. 2 Date: December 01, 2004 03:08 PM (For actual publication date see newsletter.) Title: Inherently safe red herrings
Copyright © 2004 - Access to Energy Newsletter Archive
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