Item — HN Reader

I've been thinking about this for a bit and had a similar model in mind. You build small nuclear reactors in a containers - similar how Google builds their DC. You find an abandoned coal mine shaft and put them deep in the ground. The cost optimizations come from:

- economies of scale

- no decommission costs - you just leave them to decay.

- fewer security measures.

2 comments

Wouldn't you need a water supply for steam turbines? And if there's water in your mine, it seems like it could transport radioactive particles out.

Yes, you need to exchange heat, most likely water since it's most cost effective.

> And if there's water in your mine, it seems like it could transport radioactive particles out

You need to pick a really deep and isolated shaft (Some gold mine shafts can reach 4 km)

The best economies of scale comes from building many LARGE reactors - not small ones.

I'm not sure how do you mean. You get economy of scale by saving in costs gained by an increased level of production. It's cheaper to create 100 widgets for 100 small reactors in 10 locations, then for 10 large reactors.

The efficency also scales with size in this case - separate from the per unit production scale.

It is still cheaper and more efficient to have a 1.2 GW diesel power plant instead of a warehouse of thousands of back up generators wired together.

I disagree. If one generator fails, it's not a big problem. If you have a failure in a large reactor it's a biggie, so you have to use very expensive materials and design to avoid failure.