☢️ Nuclear Powered EV w/100 year fill-up

[svetz]

Another Sunday morning and I'm sitting here eating radiation for breakfast, about ~0.1 microsieverts of radiation. I find it helps energize me through the day.

By now, those with coffee, have figured out I'm eating an average banana.

If radioactivity is already all around us and in what we eat; then why not a nuclear-powered reactor for your EV that runs for 100 years without ever filling or recharging?

Radiation ​ So, most of us don't want to grow a finger out of ear; how much radiation is too much? How much if you give up bananas? Could cars be powered safely, or would it be one of those well-meaning things that ends up making things much worse? The illustration to the right shows the average annual public dose is 1 mSv and there's the thread Radiation Age and the prudent person where I learned a whole lot about radioactivity from @upnorthandpersonal and others. Radiation does pose a risk, could we properly shield a vehicle to make them safe? Could they be engineered so that 200,000 car accidents per year won't cause irreparable damage to people and the environment? Would self-driving cars minimize accidents to where any cleanup was manageable?

The Cadillac Thorium Car​

There have been numerous proposals since the 50's. This is cadillac's 2009 concept car.

As a design exercise to show what a vehicle capable of lasting 100 years without maintenance could look like, Cadillac debuted at the 2009 Chicago Auto Show its World Thorium Fueled concept car powered by nuclear energy. ... the technology is within our reach.

...the ...laser beam turns water into pressurized steam, spinning a turbine and generating electricity. The system can produce a total of 250 kilowatts (equivalent 335 horsepower), weighs about 500 pounds, and can fit under the hood of a car.

If not Cars, what about trucks?​

When there's an accident between a semi-tractor trailer and a car, we know who is more likely to come out more intact. Are there locations more likely to survive than others that might make it reasonable to power the largest vehicles on the roads?

Thorium?​

As per the Marvel MCU, can Thor (or his namesake at least) save the planet?

Thorium-based reactors are safer because the reaction can easily be stopped and because the operation does not have to take place under extreme pressures. Compared to uranium reactors, thorium reactors produce far less waste and the waste that is generated is much less radioactive and much shorter-lived. ref

What do you think? Science fiction that will soon come to age, or ain't ever gonna happen? Have you read something or know about the topic stuff you can share?

Let's hear it!

 

[svetz]

Seems like energy from a stationary nuclear power plant to create green fuels for ICE engines would work with the existing infrastructure and be a lot safer overall.

 

[svetz]

This is interesting about thorium, but it would need someone smarter than me to fact-check. From Wikipedia: ​ But beta particles aren't hard to block. Using the image to the right, the beta particles can be shielded with something as light as aluminum? The reaction doesn't give off fast neutrons, so that might be all that's needed. But, it looks like impurities in the fuel could generate neutrons. If those neutrons are "fast" they can cause side reactions forming neutrons that are harder to shield: ​ Most of the neutrons would be absorbed by the surrounding Thorium. You probably couldn't refine out all the impurities to make the fuel cheap enough. But, could you get the impurities at a reasonable cost such that the emitted radiation is "safe enough"?​

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[upnorthandpersonal]

Thermalizing fast neutrons/shielding tends to require a lot of material (volume wise) for example borated high density polyethylene to be effective. I have a tiny neutron source (AmBe source, flux of 1000 n/s iirc) in my lab and that one is encased in a pretty large cube. You also have secondary gammas created by neutron interactions, so you need gamma shielding in addition.

In principle, beta particles are not hard to block (they're just high energy electrons), but they're the least of your trouble if you have to inject neutrons in your thorium reactor to begin with - and it'll be a lot more neutrons than that little source of mine.

Having nuclear reactors in every car isn't a very good idea. You end up having sources everywhere, unaccounted for, and you end up in situations like the Genoa port incident - that was just a relatively small medical source...

 

[MurphyGuy]

Let it power a few research stations in Antarctica first..

 

[Daddy Tanuki]

Let it power a few research stations in Antarctica first..

russians been powering various scientific projects with miniature nuke power since the 60's

 

[MrNatural22]

As madness is becoming common these days, It would realistically be unwise as sooner or later some unbalanced fevered fruit pies with dangerous technical knowledge would transform them into a rolling nuke bombs. ?