Took long enough

[flyweightnate]

I'm extremely skeptical of this point.
Sure, that's how things should work in any reasonable world, but a capitalist society is driven by profits and not by improving the quality of life of it's people. We've made huge advances in agriculture and medicine in the past hundred years, but there are still far too many sick and malnourished people in this country. I guarantee that if any substantial advances are made in energy production, they will be cynically used by corporations to maximize their profits and won't improve the lives of most people by much. In this world wealth and prosperity are not shared, but hoarded by a handful of greedy scumbags.

Part of the reason is Dodge v Ford Motor, where the Court literally told Ford it had to work for the benefit of its shareholders instead of employees and customers.

So it's actually government mandated to be greedy at all costs.

Shocking, right?

[Pyrate Jim]

I'm from the Government, and I'm here to help.

Those words have aged like a very expensive wine.

[flyweightnate]

Counterpoint:

What is waste?

Waste is when a costly thing is lost or traded for no benefit. Something of value given for no value.

So if we reduce the total encompassed lifecycle cost of a unit if energy by 90%, I'd say we just reduced the waste by 90% - because we are consuming only 10% of the value.

Sure, cheap energy will then push us towards more thermal processing to reduce labor, or other such energy-intensive tradeoffs. But if it truly is cheaper - both to produce, and to eliminate the effect of byproducts of production and consumption - then we have reduced waste.

If energy were free, would it even be possible to "waste" it? It's like asking if an oceangoing vessel can "waste" seawater.

I think that's the holy grail.

Until then, best I can come up with is price signals to at least penalize wasteful use, while promoting beneficial use.

[Pyrate Jim]

Some companies are still at it. Trying to make it work.
Portable nuclear plant brings microreactors to the end of the Earth

[Jsc5150]

The barrier to nuclear deployment is entirely political and bureaucratic, not really technical.


When you haven’t politically solved the waste disposal problem of the last generation of deployment, it doesn’t bode well for the future of the technology.


Additionally, the enshittification of every business structure in the country poses a real threat to private reactors.
Boeing has proved that even world class engineering-led megafirms can be infected by this, and now they have to resort to blatantly assassinating whistleblowers to cover up how f****ing cheap they are at the expense of safety.

Idk if that is necessarily a barrier to the industry in the current regulatory, but it worries me a lot.

But the Navy ain’t gonna stop putting reactors directly in the ocean on the most high value military targets imaginable, so why can’t we use them to keep warm in the winter?

[Pyrate Jim]

Deployment may be advancing.
US transports nuclear microreactor for first time, showcasing potential to deploy nuclear power

[Pyrate Jim]

How hard can it be?
12-year-old Texas schoolboy builds a nuclear fusion reactor at home

[SignOfZeta]

Some months back when my account was deleted with no warning and no explanation many of my posts were deleted and never recovered including all the posts in this thread where I questioned the fantastic claims of every quack rip-off nuclear startup company that a low attention-span fission fanboy can post a link to.

Over the course of the past year there have been zero new breakthroughs. The article mentioned in the OP dealt with Radiant Industries who do still occasionally release fund raising pitches to their YouTube channel and are STILL hosting the hilarious “reserve now” button you can click to (I’m not joking!) request how many nuclear reactors (they they haven’t even prototyped yet) you want to order. They still haven’t gone critical. They still haven’t explained shielding. They have nothing. They never will. This is all hype.

The Palisades plant in Michigan is amazing still (I think) on track to running again. They have fuel on site…and already at least one accident when a worker had go through a decontamination process after he ingested some water after falling into the reactor cavity that had been used for 40 years. So…think about that. Think about how people who can’t grasp ladder safety need to be in charge of a gigantic doomsday device for this “brave” (actually suicidal) plan to take place. It seems that he was wearing a life vest but no tether while working close to an edge with no guardrails…and if that isn’t just the perfect metaphor for the entire kamikaze industry I don’t know what is…

[Pyrate Jim]

Some months back when my account was deleted with no warning and no explanation many of my posts were deleted and never recovered including all the posts in this thread where I questioned the fantastic claims of every quack rip-off nuclear startup company that a low attention-span fission fanboy can post a link to. Vent often?

in charge of a gigantic doomsday device for this “brave” (actually suicidal) plan to take place.

That last is where you are fundamentally wrong. What's being attempted is the exact opposite.
Creating a clean energy source small enough to transport and power a remote farm, not some city grid.
Not using refined, weapons grade plutonium. Certainly not enough material to reach critical mass or melt down.
Smaller, easier contained and maintained. Nothing "gigantic" nor any sort of "Doomsday Device"

It's not hype. "They have nothing, they never will". That's what they said about the Wright Brothers.
That's what the Japanese said before Hiroshima. America said it about Russia before Sputnik.
Even after the atom bomb, they said that controlling that force was all hype. How many nuclear reactors are operating globally now?

I think you are scared of the word "radiation".
As soon as you see that word, you think bombs, fallout, 3-mile island, Chernobyl, Fuku Jima.
I, myself, exhibit symptoms of radiation poisoning. Patches of subdermal hemorrhaging.
Not because I handled isotopic radionuclides in school. From Solar radiation.
From exposure to the Sun. It's called "Solar Pupura" if you want to look it up.

If you really need to call something a "Gigantic Doomsday" device ~ You're looking in the wrong direction.

[SignOfZeta]

You are a believer. Your mentality is not a scientific one, it’s loaded with multiple classic logical fallacies. Your thoughts are not scientific they are scientistic. You love and respect science more than you understand it. You’re not a thinking person on this matter you are bought in. You’re not testing hypothesis and measuring the results. You already know what is real. Nobody can tell you. You do not demand proof. You are your own proof. This is the least scientific state of mind there is.

“That’s what they said about…” is a classic logical trap.

There were people who doubted the Wright Brothers. Those people were wrong.

Around the same time there were also people who said you’ll never build a Time Machine, and those people are still correct.

So where do we put the people who want to sell a power supply from StarCraft? In two years? Is it simply a matter of time? Or is it impossible? Or is it just so hard that it will never happen (which is essentially the same as impossible)? We may know soon!

Radiant Industries, amazingly, put out another video already and it’s not a guy in a room talking to a camera about platitudes. This one is on the scene with Congressman Chuck who seems like a decent sort and he’s there with some people pouring concrete, very recently, for a facility they are saying will SHIP a fully functioning system before the end of 2028, which is less than a year and a half away. Again, they are just now pouring the floors for this place and somehow it’s going to produce a nuclear power supply in a year and a half. From a building that doesn’t have a roof or power and water yet and a company that has yet to go critical.

So if they actually do that…you’d be on track to use the Wright Bros argument, and if they actually sell 1000s of reactors and only occasionally do they kill anyone you’d be %100 correct to use that popular cliche.

But in reality? 2028 is not far away. I’m working on engineering projects that go into 2028 myself, way less cutting edge, and 2028 seems very close to me. This is almost certainly not happening. So when 2028 comes around, this forum will still be here, and we’ll be able talk about what caused their failure to produce the space age nuclear dream.

[Pyrate Jim]

I'm a believer in human ingenuity. Based on how many cried "It can't be done" ~ Yet now exist.

Don't know about "StarCraft", Sounds like a video game. Neither do I know "Radiant Industries".
Although I've learned when Congress gets involved, you're already throwing sand into the gears of progress.

But I would agree that 2028 is unrealistic. Some things need patience, time to achieve fruition.
We, as a race, have come a long way since Isaac Newton postulated His "Laws of Nature".
It took a century for technology to show there are layers, levels of atomic structure that can be harnessed for benefit rather than destruction.

This is technology that isn't going away just because someone folks say it can't be done.
There will be hurdles, obstacles and defeats. Yet progress will continue regardless, the nuclear dream as you call it will inch closer to reality.

You cannot deny it. The stone does not stop the river.