Micro nuke, nuclear "battery".

Looks interesting, though the use of liquid sodium as a coolant worries me if only because it is dangerous stuff.

I think Alaska will let this one fly. I'd like to think this state is a lot less reactionary than the rest of the country.

Reply to
Eric Gisse
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And people even went back to work, right at the Chernobyl site, within weeks of the accident.

Well said. He's completely wrong, of course. Not even good fiction: )

Karl Johanson

Reply to
Karl Johanson

Uh, sodium cooled valves are used in many light aircraft engines. I think people might notice if they caused much trouble.

Regards,

Bill Ward

Reply to
Bill Ward

I have only known about Sodium being used in its' heat transfer capacity in nuclear reactors, and even then within the same breath it is usually mentioned that it is a pain in the ass when it leaks.

I didn't know about it being used in aircraft engines though. I hope all the valves related to that coolant system are well-labeled.

Reply to
Eric Gisse

I beleive the sodiuum is sealed in the valves, and the sodium in the reactor must circulate through heat exchangers to do any useful work.

And sodium in contact with air or water is dangerous.

Reply to
Richard Henry

^^^^^^^^^ obviously the responder can't read..

A single low yield weapon has minimal long term effects..

Mr. Bell just reiterates the previous statment,and then makes a invalid association already identified my post.

The wildlife around Chernobyl suffers from many genetic mutations and shorten lifespan. Effects of radiation exposure is a function of type, distance, susceptibility, and duration. Short lived animals will endure reduced effects, but they're unlikely to stand up and complain.

Taking out a N-reactor facility places large amounts of medium weight isotopes into the food chain.

Consuming contaminated food stuffs reduces the distance of exposure down to zero. Humans are a relatively long lived species. Internal exposure to elevated levels of radiation dramatically shortens human life spans. A reduction to a point where it's doubtful that one could sustain a meaningful society. (20 year lifespan.. if you're lucky..)

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ to humans who wish to continue their existence..

Chernobyl was not a worse case incident.. Approx.. 1/3 of contents of reactor core was released by a chemical fire.. (with cool down pool and on site storage flasks remaining intact.) A Nuke strike on reactor will be far.. far.. more deadly..

Cities import most of their food from the outside the metro area.. Contaminate those food growing areas and the city residents will have little choice but to consume contaminated food.

Taking out a US N-Plant which has been operating for a couple of decades is roughly equivalent to the radiological release from 37,000 Hiroshima bombs over several states.. Thus denying the local population access to uncontaminated food growing regions.

Soviet Union took many steps in an attempt to mitigate exposure by redistributing food stuffs (country wide) after the accident. That social infrastructure is unlikely to survive a substantial enemy attack on multiple N-plant facilities, thus metro residents stuck consuming large amounts of contaminated food and suffer the consequences. .

Chernobyl generated it's last Kwh in 2000..

Reply to
T.Keating

short lived -> short-lived worse -> worst food growing -> food-growing it's -> its illiterate generation

Reply to
Autymn D. C.

I would like to see the exchangers wrouht into a liquid-plasmic beryllium cannon. U, make that a /radioactive/ liquid-plasmic beryllium cannon.

-Aut

Reply to
Autymn D. C.

wrouht -> wrought

Reply to
Richard Henry

wrought -> wrouht Off with your Norman Cretin scum!

Reply to
Autymn D. C.

Sodium isn't a pain when it leaks (well it is, but not the main one). The problem is when it freezes. For most first gen thermal neutron reactor designs they needed to be steam heated even when shut down because there was no way to recover them from a frozen coolant incident. The first Soviet Alfa submarine was decomissioned early on, reportedly after just such a problem.

Presumably this 4S design is one with a simplified primary circuit that can survive freezing - it's typical of the inherently safe designs that they're moving towards "block" designs rather than external pipes and this encourages freeze tolerance.

Reply to
Andy Dingley

---snip

Perhaps you can tell me why there appears to be no interest in alloys of potassium and sodium, which freeze at temperatures down to -12 C. I know that this has been used in the past. Is there a problem with potassium?

Reply to
Paul Studier

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