nuclear waste is a big problem that bad politics and
expensive science ( fast burning reactors) have not solved.
the problem is that plain disposal is expensive and
'burning' the waste in a reactor while financially attractive
from the perspective of making electricity--------and from
not
needing the disposal technology---still suffers from the
extroadinarily high construction cost of fast breeding
reactors.
i propose an electricity producing system that doesn't use a
reactor.
take the fuel assemblies and put them in salt water pools
that are fed with ocean water.
the pools is adjacent to a fresh water pool but separated
by a huge paper like membrane that actually produces a
current of electricity resulting from the passive osmotic
tendency of salt ions to migrate across the membrane
from salt water to fresh water .
the thing is----the salty water is quite warm because of
extensive heating from the slowly decaying rod
assemblies.
the heat creates major evaporation of the water. the
evaporating water make the water MORE salty. even as
ions are leaving it to go to the fresh water thereby making
the fresh water more salty.
the current from this battery results from the difference in
the volatage of the waters---which results from the
difference in their salinity.
as the salt water evaporates and becomes MORE salty, the
fresh water is also getting more salty. so what do we do?
we use a condenser to condense the very humid moisture
INTO THE THE FRESH WATER POOL.
this keep the fresh water pool substanially purer than the
salt water pool. and keeps the current going.
eventually a tremendous amount of extremely salty water
is left in the nuclear fuel pool . some of the salt will
precipitate out. and you can sell that salt so long as it is
kept generally out of the direct irradation with the
assemblies (you can put the assemblies in salt/rust
protecting heat conducting casks)
the mostly fresh/water pool eventually reaches a point
where it has too much water in it.
at the same time the the salt water pool goes beyond the
point of depeletion, as too much water has evaporated,
at this point. you simply flush the excess spill over of the
fresh water pool into the salt water pool. and to fill more
you can just let MORE sea water into the salt water nuclear
pool.
the key here is that the fresh water pool is always going to
be operating actually as slightly brackish.
the sea water pool is constantly going to be concentrating
the salt because of heat and evopration EVEN AS IS IT
LOSING IONS ACROSS THE MEMBRANE TO MAKE
ELECTRICITY.
so even as the salt water is losing ions and the fresh water
is gaining them----the net loss of water in the salt water
pool is always making it saltier ( possibly even creating
precipitated salt ) and the brackish water pool is constantly
being diluted to prevent it from becoming 'saline' water of
higher salt concentration.
the salt water pool is continuously operating at a
hypersaline 'brine' level of saltiness, remixing any
precipitates that fall to its bottom. and adding sea water
as necessary to refill the amount of water that escapes the
systems recycling channels using condensors and using
flood gates to let 'fresh' water flood back into the salty
water area when there is overflow.
the key here is that the salt 'cycle' is driven by the heat
cycle of evaporation. and recycling of water brings with it
the recycling of the salt (which does not accumulate in the
fresh water pond beyond the level at which the membrane
stops producing a voltage).
these kinds of salt water batteries have actually been built
in estuaries, harnesssing the natural hydrological cycle
powered source of power bringing fresh and brackish water
together in estuaries.
in our case, we are using nuclear waste assemblies to
power the process.the net energy produced powers the
sluice gates, powers an ACTIVE consender system and
other machinery, and ultimately provides surplus power to
the grid.
the only thing you need is the membranes. and they aren't
complex catalysts like fuel cells. they are simpler than you
think.
if the system breakdown you simply let the gates open and
allow the fuel assemblies to take advantage of passive
cooling as sea water simply floods into the pools to keep
the assemblies cool on a continuous basis.