After It Is All Over (Decommissioning)
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- čas přidán 13. 05. 2019
- How to disassemble a nuclear reactor and detailed pictures of deconstructing the TRIGA nuclear reactor at the University of Illinois. Map of the US showing which plants are in which stage of this process. Costs and economics of decommissioning.
Just imagine the quality of stories that this man will tell his grand kids someday.
He's already telling them! He said in a recent video his grand-daughter watches the channel.
This Channel is dope, all these videos need more views.
I agree
Which is why we're all liking every video right? ;)
I'd love to see this channel suddenly blow up to 50-100k subs
Unfortunately folks would rather watch trending dances instead of educational media.
This man rocks the short sleeve shirt as if he invented it. Respect
I love how he called out the decision to remove the reactor building. I bet there was a lot of politics involved in that decision and he wasn't happy about it.
Think about it the other way. They have a field where there used to be a nuclear reactor for years on end. And now it's a green field where people walk over and picknick. No one is dying. No one is getting cancer. You can take your geiger counter there and verify everything is completely normal. There is no better way to show we can handle all nuclear stuff safely than to show the perfect oposite of what people against nuclear power tell us every now and then. It costed them a single building, but that might actually be worth it.
@Ted Longings The next time someone says Nuclear power is bad and mention Chernobyl and Fukushima, ask them for another disaster and watch them go uh, uh, uh all day long lol. Nuclear is up there in safety. Up there with renewable. A gram of Uranium would power 100 homes for an entire day. That’s the equivalent of 600 kilos of oil (1,323 pounds) or 3 tons of coal. Plus, no carbon emissions
@Ted Longings Depends on the type of nuclear... just saying.
@@snakevenom4954 You forget Three Mile Island. We all know nuclear power is not without its safety hazards. Personally, why we followed Rickover down the pressurized LWR rabbit hole vs MSRs (which Glenn Seaborg supported) is beyond me.
@@waynebreivogel1742 Fukashima, TMI, and Chernobyl were also all old technology. Modern reactors are ridiculously safe. The Fukashima reactors were at the end of their life cycles. They were actually a few years older than the Chernobyl reactors were.
Do solar panels and windmills have a ‘decommissioning’ fund? Who pays for recycling solar panels and windmills? What about Li-Ion batteries used for grid storage?
Nobody else seems to have mentioned, so... TRIGA -- "Training, Research, _Isotopes,_ General Atomics".
Nice video. Just imagine if other industries had to plan out and finance their final disassembly and recovery phases. So many super-fund sites wouldn't be an issue at all, they would have been provided for all along.
They've been trying to do it to the mining industry for decades, but they operate on such slim margins, even if they do save up for clean up, the amount they can save is paltry.
@@jermainerace4156 this is when taxing and placing that money in a fund or trust would make sense.
Then different energy would be closer to a level playing field, showing the actual cost to society, and more resistant to cost shifting we see currently
The containment building is usually the most expensive part of the entire site. Why would you PAY to DISASSEMBLE and decommission it? It's ridiculous. Just replace the reactor vessel, steam generators and whatever is needed and the site is good for another 80 years. I never understood why it's just "so logical" that after the reactor is done, the entire building needs to be decontaminated and leveled. You don't need energy any more?
agreed. this has always bothered me too.
Me too
The safety standards have changed since that old containment building was built.
New reactors need extra passive cooling capabilities to be able to resist for longer in case of a station blackout, you need a core catcher in case of a meltdown, they need extra safety systems, more pumps, more backups, etc...
Also newer reactor design are made bigger in order to be profitable. But your smaller building won't be able to contain them. So You'll have to design a new reactor from scratch to fit inside the smaller building and fit all the extra safety equipment.
The size and number of holes, pipes, doors, locks going in and out of the containment building will probably no longer match the requirements of the new reactor. Probably requiring the reactor to be tailor designed, and licensed specifically for each building.
In other words : you're designing the reactor backwards (the reactor to fit the building instead of the other way around)
And finally, you are going to have to certify that the concrete will still be able to work as a containment structure for the next 50-60 years (it needs to hold a steam explosion)
So it's easier to just build a new reactor and a new building from scratch.
They could put a new SMR or two or four into these existing containment buildings...
@@zolikoff Concrete stops being any good after 100 years for simple structures, let alone for a reactor. It constantly dries out until it crumbles so I wouldn't be very confident in 60 year old concrete holding reactors it wasn't built with consideration for.
This guy’s lecturing skills are underrated
Apparently, the asbestos is more of a hassle than a nuclear reactor.
Actually yes; notice they didn't have to wrap the building in plastic while they were turing all that radioactive concrete into rubble and dust.
San Onofre, near me, is being decommissioned now. I just hope the leave the containment buildings and name it the Dolly Pardon Memorial, and paint appropriately, changing the color scheme occasionally to honor all.
I wish he was my professor with regards to anything science related.
A true engineer. Short sleeves and a tie! 😜
My inner nerd can’t get enough of these ....
This channel is fantastic -> nuclear energy is the only real energy alternative of our time. The other options are wishful thinking and expensive dreams. Thank you for spreading this message!
At the moment that is simply not true. Wind is definitely cheaper and solar is also more competitive on price. That is not by itself an argument against nuclear, but don't oversell the message.
dschledermann well solar and wind are very land expensive, meaning large amounts of land are required to make wind and solar commercially viable.
The main downside of nuclear is the lack of safe disposal locations. The United States for example uses old reactors to store the waste, these facilities are not designed to store the waste for long periods and are a stopgap measure now for a couple decades.
Once either fusion becomes viable or we are able to construct a safe storage location for the United States nuclear has a big flaw.
@@MrCoolguy425 well, not exactly. While they do take up space, renewables is not nearly as space consuming as they are commonly rumoured to be. Wind farms don't even have to be on land or land that is usable for much else. They can be at sea or in mountainous areas. In fact they work best in those areas. Solar don't need dedicated land. Rooftops are perfectly fine places for solar.
To give an example the entire electricity demand of all of Europe could without problem be generated by wind farms in the north sea between Britain, Norway and Denmark.
@dschledermann Moving wind offshore or to mountains increases maintenance costs. Residential rooftop solar doesn’t factor in the cost of uninstalling and reinstalling a panel every time the roof leaks or a shingle needs replacement.
@@dschledermann Those two are the wishful thinking. Renewable/Unreliable power will never take over as primary power generation. Solar might make up a very large part of residential power, but factories need magnitudes more power than houses and need reliable, constant power. Nuclear or Hydroelectric would be the best for those.
Thanks Prof Ruzic. Another awesome video.
Love your videos and lectures! You teach complex things so well! Thank You Professor :)
Would be nice to know what the cost to decommission that training reactor was.
Perhaps less than the costs for the asbest-contaminated building...
Very interesting thank you. I'm enjoying the channel.
I wish netflix will make a series with you about nuclear reactors accidents and how they work etc I was just curious about the stuff happened found ur channel watched more than 10 videos in same day.The way that u teach is like telling a story to chields noone can get bored listening.
Thank you very much for this videos
I’d think decommissioning a commercial power reactor to this degree would be a whole different magilla... imagine demolishing a containment structure of three foot thick reinforced concrete.😳
Dust. I was to know more about dust management. Cutting concrete is dirty work. And why didn’t you have Mike Rowe do a video on this?
Love your content! They should have let you build a molten salt research reactor to help get MSR tech closer to commercialization.
More videos please!
So, a nuclear plant pays for itself from start to finish, the difficulty being, that it's a large-scale 110-year socio-economic and political commitment in a system where public opinion is constantly shifting.
Smart system. Nice USA!
How is it possible that this channel has only this few views.
@Matt S That is especially true inside the EU, yes.
@Matt S Poland doesn't have any nuclear facilities. UK has been facing out nuclear energy for the last decades. Belgiums old reactors have had some major problems regarding tiny fractions inside the reactor vessel. Germany, in its self-destroying wisdom, regarded shutting down most of its nuclear power plants as wishful after the 1-fatality accident in Japan 5 years ago. Holland is even worse. So your EU, I'm afraid, is also in this field, on the wrong end of history.
@Matt S Indeed, apart from a handful of French nuclear reactors, there has been virtually no new reactor built since 1980 inside the whole of the European Union. Those 'liberal' left wing bureaucrats seem to think, in all their wisdom, that those so-called 'renewables' are going to do the trick. I wish they would invest in research in Gen IV nuclear (thorium) reactors; but I'm sure they won't: nuclear is the devil in their mind so they won't change a thing.
@Matt S hahaha how typical.
@Matt S I know its old topic but i want to tell you that Poland is not that pro nuclear (sadly) for sure not most of the citizens. We started building one power plant and abandoned it after few years due to the local protests in the 90'. Today we have some gov organisation that works for 5 years the ceo earns tons of PLN and they didn't even chose the location.
Okay, so reactors and surrounding structures have to be dismantled and carted away. Will they do the same for solar farms and wind turbines? They should.
Today, solar panels are shipped overseas where individual panels, which contain toxic metals, are taken apart by women and children for recycling or dumped in a landfill. So-called "green" technologies ain't so clean after all and need to be regulated and paid for from startup to disposal
Interesting... So I had heard that there is a nuclear power plant metal recycling place, to recycle the metals that are removed from old reactors to make new reactors. Is that true? Did the metal at least get recycled? I agree with you that it does seem like a waste to greenfield the space, as long as the radioactivity is low enough in the building
The entire reactor is made to keep the radiation inside so I doubt much radiation got through. Most likely barely more than ambient
5:11 My understanding is that these academic reactors have an extremely low void coefficient for additional safety?
As far as i know, they are basically idiot proof. The only way to do any harm whatsoever is drinking the coolant
And with very low enrichment, they have a high fuel temperature coefficient. Some designs basically 'peak' and shut themselves down in seconds as the fuel heats. Provide nice pulses of neutrons for research though.
What about the huge half kilometer by half kilometer sites that have had countless spills and leaks, over stockpiling of materials and massive production of mid and high level waste including various liquid and liquid metal wastes and dangerous radioactive salts?
Or covered up/secret projects and hidden accidents?
Go ahead and be specific, then maybe a real discussion will ensue.
is it not fair to say after decomission a referbishment and installation of a new reactor can happen utilizing cooling towers and buildings already made ?
Newer reactors are larger, require more coolant, and more room. In the process of installing the new reactor you’ll make the building fall on top of the new reactor. But I do think they should just build a new reactor straight away
Why does this make me feel like im losing a close friend
I wish he’d shown how the reactor vessel was dealt with.
He did, that was all the concretehe was talkig about: they cut it into pieces and buried it with a bunch of other low level waste.
seems a little salty about taking the building down
It was done due to emotions. Same type of thinking that got California's Berkeley to ban natural gas including restaurants.
The politicians themselves don't have to pay to retrofit restaurants.
I would love to have this professor debate the political candidates in a format that gives everyone time to really talk in substantial amounts instead of 2 minute sound bites.
China is planning out decades while the US leaders only care about the next election cycle. China is building nuclear reactors to phase out coal which the USA should have done generations ago.
The only reason why we're talking about saving the coal jobs is because of terrible leadership that didn't replace coal with Nuclear. The Democrats don't care about the locals when they propose replacing mining with contractor work(green jobs). What happens when all of the homes of a state that has a declining population have solar panels, what will the workers do then?
We should be talking about turning coal country into the Silicon Valley of nuclear energy & research. That's a real legitimate pitch instead of the idea of making coal workers solar panel instillation contractors. Consider how that would transform the region. We could see growth instead of a decline.
Yeah, free speech is so "salty." Can't have that.
Except the Govn picks up the bill for the high level waste. Inn an apples with apples comparison the total true cost has to be shown, you cant just put that to one side as its significant.
My local Nuclear reactor in Trawsfyndd ( in the UK) is in the process of being decommissioned and apparently it will take 86 years to complete the task ! Seems a long time to me ?
It's because their idea is to wait until the radionuclides decay, so the decommissioning is not insanely expensive. It's insanely expensive because every single radioactive atom has to be accounted for if it can be accounted for. Never mind that ordinary buildings made of concrete are also radioactive and they're just open air demolished most of the time. It's a nuclear power plant and god damn us if we won't spend billions of dollars to make sure not a single atom of cesium makes it out!
zolikoff Thanks for the reply 👍
@@zolikoff Ah yes, regulation. How terrible to regulate something potentially dangerous. Id rather be over cautious than have an accident. Regulations arent anti nuclear, they are there to prevent accidents and malicious actors.
@@TheJorge100 Everytime when people ask why the staff of the power plant in Chernobyl made so many mistakes and ignored so many safety procedures, I remember people like "zolikoff" exist who just don't understand the reason behind regulations, safety procedures, safe reactor designs, safe decommission etc.
I mean, he seriously compared the natural-occurring radioactivity of building material with the radioactivity of contaminated reactor material. So sad.
If the decommissioned reactor parts, pieces and debris were low level radioactive, why were'nt the crews wearing any radiological protection, not even a simple respirator?
Because it's not actually raidoactive enough to need it. It's just so heavily regulated because nuclear power scares people.
@@ottopike6000 You're spreading misinformation. The reason why people didn't need to wear protection is because they were only exposed to the low level radioactive reactor parts for a very short amount of time during the disposal. It's so heavily regulated because a low level radioactive dosis for a long amount of time is a high health risk and highly increases cancer.
I firmly invite you to put a low level radioactive sample of a beta or gamma emitter near your bed for some years and test for yourself whether heavy regulation of low level radioactive waste disposal is overrated or not.
@@olska9498 I could be wrong, but my understanding is that we're talking about 10× background radiation here. There's no evidence of that causing an increased risk of cancer.
Anyone know who pays for long term waste storage?
Im currently watching the whole nuclear power series and i think i am able to understand it so far :) I was wondering if there is a limit to how many nuclear reactors there should be in the world. For example what if most container and cruise ships were to have nuclear reactors on board. Would that create too much waste?
The fuel has been taken out?
Where did it go ? In to the electricity?
Can you with enough electricity remake/reproduce the radiation that you had to input ?
The fuel degrades through a slow aging process, it is still very very dangerous, you can't reverse radioactive decay.
Why decommission at all?
The reactor could have been shut down, the room sealed for 100 years (maybe fill it with foam for security or something). After 100 years, with most of the radiation gone, it can be repurposed into a new reactor.
Asbestos would be a big problem overtime. Walls would require maintenance which would like costs much more than dismantling and building something new.
This, but don't wait 100 years. If it's inside containment you can just replace the reactor immediately.
I don't think that safety regulation in 100 years will enable to reuse a building that was made with safety regulations that are 40 years old today.
It is not only the radiation but the building themselves aged and lost strength and safety. Wear and tear.
Concrete wears out, environmental factors wear it down, safety standards are updated (seriously, you wouldn't want to even TRY to build a modern reactor in a shell from the 1970s), and probably most importantly, we're (ideally) not building the same type of reactor we're pulling out.
What a tragic waste of money to decommission them like that, especially early.
Wow that’s not so bad. Let’s go decommission Chernobyl!
Just kidding - great video.
They're currently decommissioning Chernobyl unit 4. They recently finished the "New Safe Confinement", a larger structure which was built next to the reactor and slid into place over it. It completely encloses the old improvised "Sarcophagus" built shortly after the accident, which had seriously deteriorated at that point. It was difficult for Ukraine to pay for cleanup, and the current effort is an international one, since a failure of the Sarcophagus would be bad for everyone in Europe.
With new confinement structure in place, they can begin to disassemble the sarcophagus and then start cleaning up all the high level waste still inside. The new structure was built with automated equipment for this purpose.
@@TonboIV Oh, they're going to decomission the unit that blew up. No of course not. That was my point.
@@jjohnson4153 I'm not sure what you're trying to say. Decommissioning of Unit 4 (the one that blew up) is in progress now.
Oh, man. . Giving my head a shake. . . . Follow the money
Why in the world did they green field it. That building with the crane and everything could have been used for a thousand different educational purposes.
they were embarrassed they had a nuclear reactor.
@@jmd1743 only the dumbest left-wingers can be 'embarrassed' they teach their kids technology.
@@amostake They think that EVs made sense in the era of Nicad and NIMH batteries. Throwing money at a problem wouldn't make lithium come sooner because then powertools wouldn't have used that antiquated battery technology.
"Learn to code" is the modern day "let them it cake" but the the cake statement is that the woman herself didn't say it, and it was an author who had no affiliation with the french family claimed she said it when she was only 10 years of age.
Could have solved the coal issue long ago by transitioning to nuclear generations ago.
Westinghouse should donate one of their modular micro reactors to send to Mars.
Reactors can fit in a cargo container.
It would fix that bad image nuclear has going for it. Since it's modular if they need more power they just send another reactor on the flight out.
Since it's mars it wouldn't matter if they entomb it 20 or 30 years later a bit away from the base.
Here's the video. czcams.com/video/Sh6BKKFxN_g/video.html
é Power-Phull AmériKánš
You could say they did asbestos they could.
So the fuel is just put on a regular dump truck going down the highway to the drop-off site...radiating everyone near it in traffic...or what? What do these trucks look like and how do you transport something that constantly needs a 10-foot concrete enclosure? Do you use a helicopter...or just FedEx it...so many questions. But this video answered some things that I was wondering about. Also if you go over the grass field with a Geiger meter...is there slightly more radiation?
He has a video on "high level waste", but to make it bite-sized for you no the fuel isn't "just put on a regular dump truck".
the absolute state of youtube comments smh
So, he says, the spent fuel inside those fuel rods is gone...
Great, gone where?
Incomplete story!
They got rid of the nuclear reactor building purely because the school was embarrassed about the reactor.
I wonder who was more embarrassed, the school who went through the very expensive effort of destroying a perfectly good building that once had a reactor, or Penn State & Sandusky which at the end of the day kept their football department. That sounds like a controversial statement but...
the mansplainer extraordinaire
Dump it in the sea.
I know what happened. All those mamby pamby liberals made a big stink about it.
LOL "Just send all the highly radio active sh*t to the govt. These people will take care of our garbage for free." facepalm ...
what a load of bull shit!!! you have glossed over many things in your video you talk about how cheap nuclear power is over its lifetime but you don't quote any numbers you glossed over the safety of radioactive materials and make out that it is relatively safe and easy to dispose of, whose backyard do these materials get buried in. You've virtually say nothing about the spent fuel and how toxic that is in the lifelong cost of management. It is easy to see who is paying you to say half truths of an industry that has had its time, the truth is the nuclear energy industry only existed because people wanted the material from them to make nuclear weapons.
Funny how you have done the same thing.
It is NOT over. The radioactive waste MUST be stored somewhere...so dislike. The subject was NOT depleted!
So? A few tons of high level waste get stored in a dry cask. What's the problem exactly?
@@Cutest-Bunny998
The problem is this guy forgot to tell HOW to deal with high level waste. And HOW to destroy it...
He has a whole other video about high level waste... what are you talking about?
@@ihabhatim5825
But said NOTHING about destroying the waste...
@@WadcaWymiaru you can't destroy high level waste. You can only transform it into low level waste and wait for it to turn into stable isotopes.