Army’s nuclear comeback

[buster]

Sounds promising.​

​

Janus Program aims to install commercial microreactors by 2028 following executive order.​

"Hundreds of millions" of dollars will be funneled into the project known as the Janus Program over the next five years, according to Dr. Jeff Waksman, the Army official leading the effort, to install next-generation commercial microreactors at military sites.

"It is an immense challenge in terms of providing 24/7 power. Military bases right now are powered entirely by fossil fuels. It is not possible with current technology to provide 24/7 power with solar, wind, and batteries," Waksman said. "So the only solution to the tyranny of fuel that exists now is nuclear power."

"There have been a lot of nuclear projects in the past that peaked at the press release," he said. "That is not what this is."

Under Janus, the Army will partner with the Defense Innovation Unit and the Department of Energy’s national laboratories to oversee the design and testing of commercial microreactors. The reactors will be commercially built and operated, rather than owned by the military. To encourage private investment, the Army will use a milestone-based contracting model inspired by NASA's Commercial Orbital (COTS) program — the same framework that helped launch the commercial space industry by funding companies like SpaceX and Boeing to reach key technical milestones instead of paying for traditional government procurement.
"In order to provide components that are viable under the conditions of a nuclear reactor, you need certified suppliers — and there just aren’t enough," he said. "One of our goals is to help consolidate and strengthen the industrial base so multiple companies can use the same qualified suppliers."

The Army hopes this flexible model will accelerate development, lower costs, and spur a self-sustaining market for small reactors that could eventually power both military and civilian infrastructure.

 

[cptbarkey]

I'm all for this and the residential applications. I'm not for politicization of the issue as a lame justification. Stop melting my brain. Just do it.

 

[Bailes1992]

I'm all for this and the residential applications. I'm not for politicization of the issue as a lame justification. Stop melting my brain. Just do it.

A US company called Last Energy is proposing building their very first reactor just a 3 miles from my house. I work in the nuclear design industry so know more than 'most' about how safe modern reactors are and I think they're a great idea. However, there's a select group of people within the community who are up in arms about it, spouting all sorts of rubbish and general nonsense trying to get it cancelled. I've tried so hard to reason with them, have discussions with them, even offer to go do a 'counter argument' in one of their anti-nuclear presentations to no avail. My Wife keeps asking why I get so wound up by these people, but I feel like they're holding our community back. One of their arguments keeps going back to why a US company would want to build on UK soil, and making out there must be a sinister reason for it. They totally ignore the fact the UK has THE most expensive commercial electricity in the world. And, if you're going to be able to make a profit anywhere, the UK will be it.

Truthfully, nobody has managed yet to get a microreactor to be profitable. And I imagine due to this, getting investors would be difficult and therefore I'm not sure it will go ahead. But I really hope they give it a good go and are successful. The larger projects I work on are an absolute nightmare in every direction you turn. Smaller, modular, factory built reactors has to be the future, I'm sure of it!

 

[Skippy722]

I will happily host one in my back yard... Assuming it occupies less than an acre. All I need is a steady ~10kWe!

 

[mk378]

The US still has no policy on nuclear waste. Nuclear power cannot be considered sustainable without taking care of the spent fuel waste.

 

[Bailes1992]

The US still has no policy on nuclear waste. Nuclear power cannot be considered sustainable without taking care of the spent fuel waste.

While the waste itself is hazardous, the amount of waste created during nuclear generation compared to coal or gas is tiny. What's even more amazing is the reactors that are being designed and built to run off only the waste of other reactors OR the fact that through electrolysis, you can remove the 'bad bits' of the waste which account for just 10% of the overall waste and recycle the other 90%. That tiny 10% could then be buried miles under ground, deep below any flowing water or moving bedrock, where there is zero risk to anybody.

There's options out there, and I imagine as the use of nuclear generation grows and waste starts becoming more of a problem, these solutions will get used.

 

[Pew]

"It is an immense challenge in terms of providing 24/7 power. Military bases right now are powered entirely by fossil fuels. It is not possible with current technology to provide 24/7 power with solar, wind, and batteries," Waksman said. "So the only solution to the tyranny of fuel that exists now is nuclear power."

Nukes are cool but this official obviously has never stepped on a military base to assume that they are purely powered by fossil fuels. And just for that, I'm going to assume the rest of the project is going to be nothing more than a waste so some official somewhere gets "campaign funds."

 

[MVAR]

Nukes are cool but this official obviously has never stepped on a military base to assume that they are purely powered by fossil fuels. And just for that, I'm going to assume the rest of the project is going to be nothing more than a waste so some official somewhere gets "campaign funds."

At my last job I had a few bases within my AOR (area of responsibility). These bases were connected to the bulk electric system and utilized wholesale power from >100kV sources. Each base had emergency generators for scheduled & unscheduled outages and most had them listed as EDG's (emergency diesel generators). Maybe that's what this person is referring to? I'm not really sure. Two of the bases did have base loaded generators that lessened their daily load to the BES but didn't supply enough MW for total station load.

 

[BMWTurboDzl]

A US company called Last Energy is proposing building their very first reactor just a 3 miles from my house. I work in the nuclear design industry so know more than 'most' about how safe modern reactors are and I think they're a great idea. However, there's a select group of people within the community who are up in arms about it, spouting all sorts of rubbish and general nonsense trying to get it cancelled. I've tried so hard to reason with them, have discussions with them, even offer to go do a 'counter argument' in one of their anti-nuclear presentations to no avail. My Wife keeps asking why I get so wound up by these people, but I feel like they're holding our community back. One of their arguments keeps going back to why a US company would want to build on UK soil, and making out there must be a sinister reason for it. They totally ignore the fact the UK has THE most expensive commercial electricity in the world. And, if you're going to be able to make a profit anywhere, the UK will be it.

Truthfully, nobody has managed yet to get a microreactor to be profitable. And I imagine due to this, getting investors would be difficult and therefore I'm not sure it will go ahead. But I really hope they give it a good go and are successful. The larger projects I work on are an absolute nightmare in every direction you turn. Smaller, modular, factory built reactors has to be the future, I'm sure of it!

At least with regards to military applications, profit isn't necessarily a goal.

 

[Pew]

At my last job I had a few bases within my AOR (area of responsibility). These bases were connected to the bulk electric system and utilized wholesale power from >100kV sources. Each base had emergency generators for scheduled & unscheduled outages and most had them listed as EDG's (emergency diesel generators). Maybe that's what this person is referring to? I'm not really sure. Two of the bases did have base loaded generators that lessened their daily load to the BES but didn't supply enough MW for total station load.

Initially I was thinking the Dr. was silently referring to the backup diesel generators too but it seems irresponsible for someone of his stature to not mention that military bases are not separate from the grid while simultaneously saying that military bases are only supplied by fossil fuels.

 

[BMWTurboDzl]

While the waste itself is hazardous, the amount of waste created during nuclear generation compared to coal or gas is tiny. What's even more amazing is the reactors that are being designed and built to run off only the waste of other reactors OR the fact that through electrolysis, you can remove the 'bad bits' of the waste which account for just 10% of the overall waste and recycle the other 90%. That tiny 10% could then be buried miles under ground, deep below any flowing water or moving bedrock, where there is zero risk to anybody.

There's options out there, and I imagine as the use of nuclear generation grows and waste starts becoming more of a problem, these solutions will get used.

Unfortunately the US, out of concerns for nuclear proliferation, exited the reprocessing business in the late 1970s. Now it's just expensive and it would be a heavy lift to restart that but it's not impossible. Some companies have attempted to obtain licenses to reprocess fuel but afaik that plutonium problem remains.

 

[Rmay635703]

 

[Pew]

View attachment 305044View attachment 305043

Lol the first thing I thought of was if the army was bringing back their nuclear shell-firing artillery.

 

[OVERKILL]

The US still has no policy on nuclear waste. Nuclear power cannot be considered sustainable without taking care of the spent fuel waste.

If you aren't reprocessing it, the solution is a DGR, which most nuclear nations are in the process of either building or working toward building (including your neighbours to the north). You still need a long term storage solution even if you reprocess of course.

 

[OVERKILL]

A US company called Last Energy is proposing building their very first reactor just a 3 miles from my house. I work in the nuclear design industry so know more than 'most' about how safe modern reactors are and I think they're a great idea. However, there's a select group of people within the community who are up in arms about it, spouting all sorts of rubbish and general nonsense trying to get it cancelled. I've tried so hard to reason with them, have discussions with them, even offer to go do a 'counter argument' in one of their anti-nuclear presentations to no avail. My Wife keeps asking why I get so wound up by these people, but I feel like they're holding our community back. One of their arguments keeps going back to why a US company would want to build on UK soil, and making out there must be a sinister reason for it. They totally ignore the fact the UK has THE most expensive commercial electricity in the world. And, if you're going to be able to make a profit anywhere, the UK will be it.

Truthfully, nobody has managed yet to get a microreactor to be profitable. And I imagine due to this, getting investors would be difficult and therefore I'm not sure it will go ahead. But I really hope they give it a good go and are successful. The larger projects I work on are an absolute nightmare in every direction you turn. Smaller, modular, factory built reactors has to be the future, I'm sure of it!

The problem with small and micro reactors are the economies of scale. The BWR being built at Darlington here is 300MWe and it's definitely going to cost more per kW in construction costs than building an AP1000, CANDU EC6, Monark or even possibly an EPR. Its saving grace MAY be the reduced OPEX, since the design is simplified and BWR's are already more simple than PWR's, but we won't really know what that looks like until it's operational. Fuel costs will be higher than our indigenous CANDU's, that's a given.

Truly micro modular reactors, built in a factory, have the potential to be cheaper to build, but most of the "small" in the "SMR" hype aren't really that small. The hole at Darlington B is massive, almost the same size as the containment for an EC6, but with less than half the output.

 

[JeffKeryk]

The military (government) research and development has led to so many public products we enjoy today.
Ever heard of ARPNET which started in the late 1960s?

 

[mk378]

nuclear shell-firing artillery

Though there was no formal agreement made to do so, both the USA and USSR quietly retired and dismantled their stocks of those in the early 1990s. Everyone realized they were something that humanity does not need.

 

[mk378]

[Official] ...peaked at the press release

This one peaked with the insider stock purchase 30 minutes before the announcement.

 

[Owen Lucas]

However, there's a select group of people within the community who are up in arms about it, spouting all sorts of rubbish and general nonsense trying to get it cancelled. I've tried so hard to reason with them, have discussions with them, even offer to go do a 'counter argument' in one of their anti-nuclear presentations to no avail.

I wouldn't be surprised if the local leader is funded by the Russians. Having Europe run on anything other than Russian Gaz is a threat to the Putins income, of which supposedly makes up between 25%-50% of the Kremlin's budget.

It would be standard ruski SOP to wage these campaigns to secure their income. This likely happened in Canada with the pipeline protests and here in the US as well. I'm sure Greta is on the payroll or at least a psyop from the Russians and Qataris as well.

 

[PandaBear]

Truthfully, nobody has managed yet to get a microreactor to be profitable. And I imagine due to this, getting investors would be difficult and therefore I'm not sure it will go ahead.

This is why you have to package the reactor as a sub-component of either some AI data center cluster or military base. Once you roll it into the cost of AI or military then people can't just say it is not cost effective.

There is also no NIMBY in military like residential customers.