On Wed, Dec 9, 2009 at 7:59 PM, Byron Jeff wrote: > On Wed, Dec 09, 2009 at 06:07:21PM -0500, John Gardner wrote: >> > So dig a nice hole, put the plant at the bottom of it, and bury it... >> >> Pretty much Edward Teller's proposal, two generations ago. >> >> Not much sign of a consensus, so far. > > I don't think I would do that with a standard water reactor. But these > little minis are based on pebble bed designs IIRC. That design is > physically incapable of melting down. So burying it is within the realm of > possibility. > > BAJ That's what they say - the design precludes runaway reactions and melt-down. I understand it's a very polarizing issue, and I don't see myself firmly in either category. With that said, if the thing is intrinsically fail-safe (let's say non-fail-catastrophic) and you can bury it in a hole and throw 100 tons of concrete blocks on top to prevent people from messing around with it, what's the problem? I tend to believe Vitaliy; if you're a terrorist and you have to rent a large mobile crane and spend 3 days trying to steal a couple pounds of insufficiently enriched uranium, wouldn't it be easier to "hit" some easy target or steal/acquire some other terr'st tool? -- Martin K. -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist