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Comment by southernplaces7 | Hacker News Reader

>When you ask this same faction how to fix that they'll say small modular reactors, etc. That would be great if it existed. It doesn't.

So I guess the dozens of military nuclear submarines and a dozen or so advanced aircraft carriers in the world are powered by unicorns and leprechauns?

I don't know the advanced mechanics of navy reactors, but something that generates 165 megawatts, while fitting inside a 360-foot-long, 35-foot-wide tube and still leaving room to house 130 people comfortably along with all their life support for weeks seems pretty usable as a small reactor. (the A1B reactor on the latest USN carriers takes things up to 700MW of thermal power.)

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The US Navy's demand for reactors is insensitive to cost. The tactical considerations of needing to refuel only once per decade (and in the case of subs, being quiet) outweighs all other factors. What works in the context of the navy doesn't really have a bearing in the context of commercial power generation.

And you're saying there's no means by which more economical versions of these could be built? With virtually all technologies, even complex, difficult ones, commercialization does create cost-cutting innovations. A modular, compact version of USN carrier/sub reactors without the worries about noise or extremely long refuel cycles seems feasible if the fundamental technology is already there and waiting to be (I hate this tech phrase so much but here it goes)... "disrupted"....

But the problem is that we know how to make reactors more economical: you make them larger. Maybe some smart people will find a way to bend the curve; I wish them luck. However, be careful in assuming that the aforementioned "cost-cutting innovations" via commercialization represent a free lunch. The sad fact is, most of the cost-savings from commercialization come from reducing the quality of the product, which is the one thing we don't want to compromise on when it comes to nuclear reactors.

To state the obvious, navy reactors do not have to be economical. No one is saying it’s not possible to build small reactors, it obviously is. just not for a cost or cost per watt that anyone is prepared to pay.

Navy reactors are not subject to environmentalist lawsuits and local political delays.

That's why they're cheap.

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