home Business Hyperion portable nuclear power plant goes on sale. DIY fusion reactor How to make a miniature nuclear reactor

Hyperion portable nuclear power plant goes on sale. DIY fusion reactor How to make a miniature nuclear reactor

I present to you an article about how you can make a fusion reactor their hands!

But first a few warnings:

This homemade uses life-threatening voltage during work. First, make sure you are familiar with high voltage safety regulations or have a qualified electrician friend to advise you.

When the reactor is operating, potentially harmful levels of X-rays will be emitted. Lead shielding of inspection windows is mandatory!

Deuterium that will be used in crafts– explosive gas. Therefore, special attention should be paid to checking the fuel compartment for leaks.

When working, follow safety rules, do not forget to wear protective clothing and personal protective equipment.

List of required materials:

Vacuum chamber;
Forevacuum pump;
Diffusion pump;
High voltage power supply capable of delivering 40 kV 10 mA. Negative polarity must be present;
High-voltage divider - probe, with the ability to connect to a digital multimeter;
Thermocouple or baratron;
Neutron radiation detector;
Geiger counter;
Deuterium gas;
Large ballast resistor in the range of 50-100 kOhm and about 30 cm long;
Camera and television display to monitor the situation inside the reactor;
Lead coated glass;
General tools (, etc.).

Step 1: Assembling the Vacuum Chamber

The project will require the manufacture of a high quality vacuum chamber.

Purchase two stainless steel hemispheres and flanges for vacuum systems. We'll drill holes for the auxiliary flanges and then weld it all together. Between the flanges there are sealing rings made of soft metal. If you've never boiled before, it would be wise to have someone with experience do the job for you. Because the welds must be flawless and free from defects. Afterwards, thoroughly clean the camera of fingerprints. Because they will contaminate the vacuum and it will be difficult to maintain plasma stability.

Step 2: Preparing the High Vacuum Pump

Let's install a diffusion pump. Fill it with high-quality oil to the required level (the oil level is indicated in the documentation), secure the outlet valve, which we then connect to the chamber (see diagram). Let's attach the foreline pump. High vacuum pumps are not capable of operating from the atmosphere.

Let's connect the water to cool the oil in the working chamber of the diffusion pump.

As soon as everything is assembled, turn on the fore-vacuum pump and wait until the volume is pumped out to a preliminary vacuum. Next, we prepare the high vacuum pump for startup by turning on the “boiler”. Once it warms up (which may take a while), the vacuum will drop quickly.

Step 3: "Whisk"

The whisk will be connected to the high voltage wires, which will enter the working volume through the bellows. It is best to use tungsten filament as it has a very high temperature melting, and will remain intact for many cycles.

It is necessary to form a “spherical rim” of approximately 25-38 mm in diameter from a tungsten filament (for a working chamber with a diameter of 15-20 cm) for normal operation systems.

The electrodes to which the tungsten wire is attached must be designed for a voltage of about 40 kV.

Step 4: Installation of the gas system

Deuterium is used as fuel for a fusion reactor. You will need to purchase a tank for this gas. Gas is extracted from heavy water by electrolysis using a small Hoffmann apparatus.

Let's attach the regulator high pressure, directly into the tank, add a micro-dosing needle valve, and then attach it to the chamber. The ball valve should be installed between the regulator and the needle valve.

Step 5: High Voltage

If you can purchase a power supply suitable for use in a fusion reactor, then there should be no problem. Simply take the negative 40kV output electrode and attach it to the chamber with a large 50-100k ohm high voltage ballast resistor.

The problem is that it is often difficult (if not impossible) to find an appropriate direct current source with a current-voltage characteristic (volt-ampere characteristic) that would fully meet the stated requirements of an amateur scientist.

The photo shows a pair of high-frequency ferrite transformers, with a 4-stage multiplier (located behind them).

Step 6: Neutron Detector Installation

Neutron radiation is a byproduct of the fusion reaction. It can be fixed with three different devices.

Bubble dosimeter a small device containing a gel in which bubbles form when ionized by neutron radiation. The downside is that it is an integrative detector that reports the total number of neutron emissions over the time it was in use (it is not possible to obtain instantaneous neutron velocity data). In addition, such detectors are quite difficult to purchase.

Active silver moderator [paraffin, water, etc.] located near the reactor becomes radioactive, emitting decent fluxes of neutrons. The process has a short half-life (only a few minutes), but if you place a Geiger counter next to the silver, the result can be documented. The disadvantage of this method is that silver requires a fairly high neutron flux. In addition, the system is quite difficult to calibrate.

GammaMETER. The tubes can be filled with helium-3. They are similar to a Geiger counter. When neutrons pass through the tube, electrical impulses are recorded. The tube is surrounded by 5 cm of "slowing material". This is the most accurate and useful neutron detection device, however, the cost of a new tube is prohibitive for most people and they are extremely rare on the market.

Step 7: Start the reactor

It's time to turn on the reactor (don't forget to install lead-lined sight glasses!). Turn on the foreline pump and wait until the chamber volume is evacuated to pre-vacuum. Start the diffusion pump and wait until it is fully warmed up and reaches operating mode.

Block access of the vacuum system to the working volume of the chamber.

Open the needle valve in the deuterium tank slightly.

Raise the voltage high until you see plasma (it will form at 40 kV). Remember the electrical safety rules.

If all goes well, you'll see a burst of neutrons.

It takes a lot of patience to get the pressure up to the proper level, but once it's done, it's quite easy to manage.

Thank you for your attention!

Is it possible to assemble a reactor in the kitchen? Many asked this question in August 2011, when Handle's story made headlines. The answer depends on the experimenter's goals. It is difficult to create a full-fledged electricity-generating “stove” these days. While information about technology has become more accessible over the years, mining necessary materials it became more and more difficult. But if an enthusiast simply wants to satisfy his curiosity by carrying out at least some kind of nuclear reaction, all paths are open to him.

The most famous owner The home reactor is probably the "Radioactive Boy Scout" American David Hahn. In 1994, at the age of 17, he assembled the unit in a barn. There were seven years left before the advent of Wikipedia, so a schoolboy, in search of the information he needed, turned to scientists: he wrote letters to them, introducing himself as a teacher or student.

Khan's reactor never reached critical mass, but the boy scout managed to receive a fairly high dose of radiation and many years later turned out to be unsuitable for the desired job in the field nuclear energy. But immediately after the police looked into his barn and the Environmental Protection Agency dismantled the installation, the Boy Scouts of America awarded Khan the title of Eagle.

In 2011, Swede Richard Handl attempted to build a breeder reactor. Such devices are used to produce nuclear fuel from more abundant radioactive isotopes that are not suitable for conventional reactors.

“I have always been interested in nuclear physics. “I bought all sorts of radioactive junk on the Internet: old clock hands, smoke detectors and even uranium and thorium,”

He told RP.

Is it even possible to buy uranium online? “Yes,” confirms Handl.. “At least that was the case two years ago. Now the place where I bought it has been removed.”

Thorium oxide was found in parts of old kerosene lamps and welding electrodes, and uranium was found in decorative glass beads. In breeder reactors, the fuel most often is thorium-232 or uranium-238. When bombarded with neutrons, the first turns into uranium-233, and the second into plutonium-239. These isotopes are already suitable for fission reactions, but, apparently, the experimenter was going to stop there.

In addition to fuel, the reaction needed a source of free neutrons.

"Smoke detectors have a small amount of americia. I had about 10–15 of them, and I got them from them,”

Handl explains.

Americium-241 emits alpha particles - groups of two protons and two neutrons - but there was too little of it in old sensors bought on the Internet. An alternative source was radium-226 - until the 1950s, it was used to coat clock hands to make them glow. They are still sold on eBay, although the substance is extremely toxic.

To produce free neutrons, a source of alpha radiation is mixed with a metal - aluminum or beryllium. This is where Handl's problems began: he tried to mix radium, americium and beryllium in sulfuric acid. Later, a photo from his blog of an electric stove covered in chemicals was circulated in local newspapers. But at that time, there were still two months left before the police showed up on the experimenter’s doorstep.

Richard Handle's failed attempt to obtain free neutrons. Source: richardsreactor.blogspot.se Richard Handle's failed attempt to obtain free neutrons. Source: richardsreactor.blogspot.se

“The police came for me before I even started building the reactor. But from the moment I started collecting materials and blogging about my project, about six months passed,” explains Handl. He was noticed only when he himself tried to find out from the authorities whether his experiment was legal, despite the fact that the Swede documented his every step in a public blog. “I don’t think anything would have happened. I was only planning a short nuclear reaction,” he added.

Handle was arrested on July 27, three weeks after the letter to the Radiation Safety Authority. “I only spent a few hours in jail, then there was a hearing and I was released. Initially, I was charged with two counts of violating the radiation safety law, and one count of violating the laws on chemical weapons, weapons materials (I had some poisons) and environment"- said the experimenter.

External circumstances may have played a role in Handl's case. On July 22, 2011, Anders Breivik carried out terrorist attacks in Norway. It is not surprising that the Swedish authorities reacted harshly to the desire of a middle-aged man with oriental features to build a nuclear reactor. In addition, the police found ricin and a police uniform in his house, and at first he was even suspected of terrorism.

In addition, on Facebook, the experimenter calls himself “Mullah Richard Handle.” “It's just an inside joke between us. My father worked in Norway, there is a very famous and controversial mullah Krekar, in fact, this is what the joke is about,” explains the physicist. (The founder of the Islamist group Ansar al-Islam is recognized as a Norwegian Supreme Court a threat to national security and is on the UN terrorist list, but cannot be deported because he received refugee status in 1991 - he faces the death penalty in his homeland of Iraq. - RP).

Handle, while under investigation, was not very careful. This also ended with him being charged with threatening to kill. “This is a completely different story, the case is already closed. I simply wrote on the Internet that I have a murder plan that I will carry out. Then the police arrived, interrogated me and after the hearing released me again. Two months later the case was closed. I don’t want to go into depth about who I wrote about, but there are simply people I don’t like. I think I was drunk. Most likely, the police paid attention to this only because I was involved in that case with the reactor,” he explains.

Handle's trial ended in July 2014. Three of the five original charges were dropped.

“I was sentenced only to fines: I was found guilty of one violation of the radiation safety law and one violation of the environmental law,”

He explains. For the incident with chemicals on the stove, he owes the state approximately €1.5 thousand.

During the process, Handl had to undergo a psychiatric examination, but it did not reveal anything new. “I'm not feeling too well. I didn’t do anything for 16 years. I was given a disability due to mental disorders. Once I tried to start studying and reading again, but after two days I had to quit,” he says.

Richard Handle is 34 years old. At school he loved chemistry and physics. Already at the age of 13 he was making explosives and was planning to follow in his father’s footsteps by becoming a pharmacist. But at the age of 16, something happened to him: Handl began to behave aggressively. First he was diagnosed with depression, then with paranoid disorder. In his blog, he mentions paranoid schizophrenia, but stipulates that over 18 years he was given about 30 different diagnoses.

I had to forget about my scientific career. Most Handle's life is forced to take medications - haloperidol, clonazepam, alimemazine, zopiclone. He has difficulty accepting new information and avoids people. He worked at the plant for four years, but also had to leave due to disability.

After the reactor incident, Handl has not yet figured out what to do. There will be no more posts about poisons and atomic bombs on the blog - he is going to post his paintings there. “I don’t have any special plans, but I’m still interested in nuclear physics and will continue to read,” he promises.

The tragedies at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and the Fukushima nuclear power plant have shaken humanity’s confidence that nuclear energy is the future. Some countries, such as Germany, have generally come to the conclusion that nuclear power plants should be abandoned altogether. But the issue of using nuclear energy is very serious and does not tolerate extreme conclusions. Here you need to clearly evaluate all the pros and cons, and quickly look for golden mean and alternative solutions for using the atom.

Organic fossils, oil, and gas are used as energy sources on Earth today; renewable energy sources - sun, wind, wood fuel; hydropower - rivers and all kinds of reservoirs suitable for these purposes. But oil and gas reserves are being depleted, and, accordingly, the energy obtained with their help is becoming more expensive. Energy obtained from wind and sun is quite an expensive pleasure due to the high cost of solar and wind power plants. The energy capabilities of reservoirs are also very limited. Therefore, many scientists still come to the conclusion that if Russia runs out of oil and gas reserves, the alternatives to abandoning nuclear energy as an energy source are very small. It has been proven that the world's resources of nuclear fuel, such as plutonium and uranium, are many times greater than energy resources natural reserves of organic fuel. The operation of nuclear power plants themselves has a number of advantages over other power plants. They can be built anywhere, regardless of the energy resources of the region, nuclear power plant fuel has a very high energy content, these stations do not emit harmful emissions into the atmosphere, such as toxic substances and greenhouse gases, and consistently provide the cheapest energy. In the world ranking by the level of thermal power plants, Russia is very far behind, and in terms of nuclear power plant indicators, we are one of the first, so for our country, abandoning nuclear energy could threaten a great economic disaster. Moreover, it is in Russia that certain issues in the development of nuclear energy, such as the construction of mini nuclear power plants, are especially relevant. Why? Everything here is obvious and simple.

The project of one of the ASMM - "Uniterm"

Nuclear reactors low power(100-180 MW) have been successfully used in the shipping of our country for several decades. IN Lately They are increasingly beginning to talk about the need to use them to provide energy to remote areas of Russia. Here small nuclear power plants will be able to solve the problem of energy supply, which has always been acute in many hard-to-reach regions. Two thirds of Russia is a zone of decentralized energy supply. First of all, this is the Far North and Far East. The standard of living here largely depends on the energy supply. In addition, these regions are of great value due to the large concentration of mineral resources. Their production does not develop or often stops precisely because of the high costs in the energy and transport sectors. Energy here comes from autonomous sources using fossil fuels. And the delivery of such fuel to hard-to-reach areas is very expensive due to the required huge volumes and long distances. For example, in the Republic of Sakha in Yakutia, due to the fragmentation energy system for low-power isolated areas, the cost of electricity is 10 times higher than on the “mainland”. It is absolutely clear that for a large territory with a low population density, the problem of energy development cannot be solved by large-scale network construction. Low-power nuclear power plants (LPNPs) are one of the most realistic ways out of the situation in this matter. Scientists have already counted 50 regions in Russia where such stations are needed. They, of course, will lose in terms of the cost of electricity to a large power unit (it is simply unprofitable to build one here), but will benefit from a fossil fuel source. According to experts, ASMM can save up to 30% on the cost of electricity in hard-to-reach regions. Small volumes of fuel consumed, ease of movement, low labor costs for commissioning, minimum maintenance personnel - these characteristics make SNPPs indispensable energy sources in remote areas.

The indispensability of ASMM has long been recognized in many other countries of the world. The Japanese have proven that such stations will be very effective in megacities. The operation of one separate such device is enough to supply energy to a certain number of residential buildings or skyscrapers. Small reactors do not require expensive and sometimes unavailable space to locate them in a metropolitan area. Also, Japanese developers claim that these reactors can compensate for peak loads in large urban areas. Japanese company Toshiba already long time is developing the ASMM project - Toshiba 4S. According to the developers' forecasts, its service life is 30 years without fuel reloading, power is 10 MW, dimensions are 22 by 16 by 11 meters, the fuel of such a mini-nuclear power plant is a metal alloy of plutonium, uranium and zirconium. This station does not require constant maintenance, but only needs occasional monitoring. The Japanese propose to use such a reactor in oil production, and they want to launch their serial production by 2020.

American scientists are not lagging behind Japan either. Within a few years, they promise to commercialize a small nuclear reactor that will provide energy to small villages. The power of such a station is 25 MW, and it is slightly larger in size than a dog kennel. This mini-nuclear power plant will generate electricity around the clock and its cost per 1 kilowatt-hour will be only 10 cents. Reliability is also good top level: in addition to the steel body, Hyperion is rolled into concrete. Only specialists can change the nuclear fuel here, and this will have to be done every 5-7 years. The manufacturing company Hyperion has already received a license to produce such nuclear reactors. The approximate cost of the station is $25 million. For a town with at least 10 thousand houses, it’s quite inexpensive.

As for Russia, they have been working on the creation of small nuclear power plants for quite a long time. Scientists at the Kurchatov Institute 30 years ago developed the Elena mini-nuclear power plant, which does not require maintenance personnel at all. Its prototype still operates on the territory of the institute. The electrical power of the station is 100 kW, it is a cylinder weighing 168 tons, with a diameter of 4.5 and a height of 15 meters. “Elena” is installed in a mine at a depth of 15-25 meters and covered with concrete ceilings. Its electricity is enough to provide heat and light small village. Several other projects similar to Elena have been developed in Russia. They all match necessary requirements reliability, safety, inaccessibility to outsiders, non-proliferation of nuclear materials, etc., but require considerable construction work when installed and do not meet mobility criteria.

In the 60s, a small mobile station “TES-3” was tested. It consisted of four tracked self-propelled transporters mounted on a reinforced base of the T-10 tank. A steam generator and a water reactor were placed on two conveyors; a turbogenerator with an electrical part and a station control system were placed on the remaining ones. The power of such a station was -1.5 MW.

In the 80s, a small nuclear power plant on wheels was developed in Belarus. The station was named “Pamir” and installed on a MAZ-537 “Hurricane” chassis. It consisted of four vans, which were connected by high-pressure gas hoses. The power of Pamir was 0.6 MW. The station was primarily intended to operate in a wide temperature range, which is why it was equipped with a gas-cooled reactor. But what happened just during these years Chernobyl accident, “automatically” destroyed the project.

All of these stations had certain problems that prevented their widespread introduction into production. Firstly, it is impossible to provide high-quality protection from radiation due to the large weight of the reactor and the limited carrying capacity of transport. Secondly, these mini-nuclear power plants ran on highly enriched nuclear fuel of “weapons” grade, which was contrary to international norms that prohibited the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Thirdly, it was difficult to create protection against road accidents and terrorists for self-propelled nuclear power plants.

The entire range of requirements for the nuclear power plant was satisfied by the floating nuclear thermal power plant. It was founded in St. Petersburg in 2009. This mini-nuclear power plant consists of two reactor units on a smooth-deck non-self-propelled ship. Its service life is 36 years, during which the reactors will need to be rebooted every 12 years. The station can become an effective source of electricity and heat for hard-to-reach regions of the country. Another of its functions is desalination of sea water. It can produce from 100 to 400 thousand tons per day. In 2011, the project received a positive conclusion from the state environmental assessment. No later than 2016, a floating nuclear power plant is planned to be located in Chukotka. Rosatom expects large foreign orders from this project.

It also recently became known that one of the companies controlled by Oleg Deripaska, Eurosibenergo, together with Rosatom announced the organization of the AKME-Engineering enterprise, which will work on the creation of nuclear power plants and promote them on the market. In the operation of these stations they want to use fast neutron reactors with lead-bismuth coolant, which they were equipped with in Soviet times nuclear submarines. They are designed to provide energy to remote areas not connected to power grids. The organizers of the enterprise plan to gain 10-15% of the world market for mini-nuclear power plants. The success of this campaign causes analysts to doubt the declared cost of the station, which, according to Eurosibenergo forecasts, will be equal to the cost of a thermal power plant of the same capacity.

The success of small nuclear power plants in the global energy market is not difficult to predict. The need for their presence there is obvious. Issues with improving these energy sources and bringing them into compliance with the necessary parameters can also be resolved. The only global problem remains the cost, which today is 2-3 times more than a 1000 MW nuclear power plant. But is such a comparison appropriate in this case? After all, ASMMs have a completely different niche for use - they must provide autonomous consumers. None of us would think of comparing the cost of kilowatts consumed by a clock powered by a battery and a microwave oven powered from an outlet.

“And for storing nuclear waste at home, we get a discount on the mortgage,” was the joke of a certain cartoonist who is not too fond of nuclear energy. But although nuclear power plants have not yet been created in the kitchen, it seems that everything is heading that way. How do you like a miniature nuclear station designed for groups of houses or private companies? It can already be ordered from the manufacturer. Let's leave legal approvals in our country outside the scope of the story.

The US Federal Laboratories Technology Transfer Consortium (FLC) recently presented the Notable Technology Development Award to Santa Fe-based Hyperion Power Generation. The Hyperion Power Module, an almost home-made nuclear power reactor, is recognized as an outstanding achievement.

Hyperion is an unusually compact installation powered by low-enriched uranium. She is capable of issuing electrical power 25-27 megawatts, which is enough for 20 thousand average households or not too large industrial enterprise. The price of “nuclear” electricity from this device will be 10 cents per kilowatt-hour, the developers promise.

But maybe these “reactors of the future” themselves are incredibly expensive? No. John Deal, chief executive of Hyperion, says: “They will cost about $25 million. For a community of 10,000 households, this would be a very affordable purchase—only $2,500 per home.”

In addition to the steel body, Hyperion is also clad in a concrete shell. Only a few pipes go outside. Interestingly, to reload nuclear fuel, the entire reactor module is supposed to be dismantled and taken to the manufacturing plant, and then (with a fresh “charge”) – back. Fortunately, this reactor is easy to transport by truck, plane or ship. Expensive? But it is very safe. To the end user, this unit will be an “unbreakable box” (illustration by Los Alamos National Laboratory).

Something is definitely changing in the world. Think about it - we are talking about a small but real nuclear power plant. Are you ready to see one in your neighbor's yard? However, you won’t be able to admire the new product, except during installation. After all, the Hyperion Power Module must be buried in the ground - for the sake of greater safety, of course.

The first buyers of the new product, however, will not be eccentric owners of cottages in prestigious areas (imagine, it’s lazy to throw out such a thing in a conversation: “And yesterday I portable nuclear power plant bought..."), and industrial companies. Hyperion has already received orders for 100 of its units, mainly from oil and energy companies.

Production of Hyperion modules should begin within five years. The first copy will go to Romania to one of the enterprises of the Czech company TES, which has already purchased six reactors, as they say, “off the drawing board” and plans to buy 12 more. Interest in Hyperion was also shown in the Cayman Islands, Panama, and the Bahamas...

But this is just the beginning. Hyperion Power Generation intends to open three plants in different parts of the world to produce 4,000 such units between 2013 and 2023.

Nuclear reactor in wristwatch? Calm down – this is just a “designer” Radio Active watch from Tokyoflash. Now no longer in production. Indication of core loading and radiation level reflects hours and minutes (photos from tokyoflash.com).

What's the point of a lot of tiny nuclear power plants? The justification for the introduction of such energy sources in remote areas, even in very small settlements, at a high pace of construction (a conventional nuclear power plant takes 10 years to build, a portable one, assembled at a factory, is installed on site “in one go”), low price and simplicity.

If conventional nuclear power plants produce gigawatts of energy, a new generation of small and, one might even say, miniature nuclear power plants (to which the Hyperion Power Generation belongs) operates with capacities that are two to three orders of magnitude less.

Such small reactors themselves are not new. Suffice it to recall strategic submarines, aircraft carriers or nuclear-powered icebreakers. But it’s one thing to have fleets, which are “toys” of a giant state machine, and quite another thing to have our own nuclear power plant, which some rich town can buy together.

The main thing is that the town is progressive and trusts scientists and engineers. What do the latter claim?

The fully self-regulating Hyperion system has inherent safety. The authors of the technology assure that this reactor will never reach supercritical mode and will never melt from overheating, and if someone deliberately damages the shell (which is generally supposed to be “buried” underground and protected), a tiny amount of active material will quickly cool down. (At the same time, “weapons-grade” uranium cannot be obtained from the nuclear fuel available in the device, the company emphasizes.)

There are no moving parts inside the main module, which increases the reliability of the system. And this nuclear power plant does not require maintenance for months, or even years. It automatically adjusts the generated power depending on the current load on the network. And the service life at one gas station is (according to various sources) from 5 to 10 years. At the same time, nuclear waste in one cycle turns out to be half the size of a soccer ball.

Over the decades of his career, Otis Peterson has received many awards for developments not only in the nuclear field, but also, for example, in the field of lasers (photo Los Alamos National Laboratory).

Now it’s time to talk about the inventor of the subminiature energy reactor. This is Dr. Otis "Pete" Peterson from the Los Alamos National Laboratory. It was in the cradle of the atomic bomb that the initial work on the installation, now called Hyperion, took place. Moreover, the design of the device goes back to a project almost 50 years ago, which has already proven its safety and ease of use as a so-called training reactor.

Remember at the beginning we talked about the technology transfer consortium prize? All the “secrets” of the miniature nuclear power plant were transferred by the Los Alamos laboratory to Hyperion, which received a license from the state to replicate and commercialize Peterson’s development.

By the way, in the same Los Alamos there is the second office of the Hyperion company, the one where the developers of the miracle system work. The company's headquarters are located in the state capital.

Interestingly, Hyperion Power Generation is not a pioneer in the niche of miniature civil nuclear power plants. She only represents shining example a growing new direction in the industry, which suggests that tiny and highly automated nuclear power plants, scattered across remote corners of the world, will help individual settlements those experiencing difficulties with energy supply, and the planet as a whole - by reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Is this really a renaissance of nuclear energy, peeking through the veil of public mistrust (caused, first of all, by the Chernobyl tragedy)? We will not undertake to say for sure. But let's look at other examples.

In the 1960s, there was surprising public optimism about the future of nuclear power. Some even dreamed of nuclear-powered cars, and helpful industrialists stirred up the public’s interest with “atomic concepts” (such as the 1962 Ford Seattle-ite XXI - pictured). You can learn about its history (photo from shorey.net).

A “floating nuclear power plant” (FNPP) is, of course, not yet “ home reactor"(after all, this nuclear power plant vessel will weigh more than 20 thousand tons), but the electrical output power of 70 megawatts allows us to write Russian project(developing for several years) into the category mentioned above.

Two reactors on board the floating nuclear power plant “barge”, “parked” off the coast, should supply this or that city with both electricity and heat. Structurally, the installation is similar to power plants nuclear icebreakers, the richest operating experience of which is available in our country. Such a station is much cheaper than a classic nuclear power plant.

A pilot model of the floating nuclear power plant is already being built in Severodvinsk (where it will operate). The plans include Pevek and Vilyuchinsk.

And you just need to remember the Toshiba 4S mini-nuclear power plant - a really tiny reactor (underground, encapsulated), capable of supplying 10 megawatts to the network.

The Japanese have long proposed installing such a mini-station in Alaska - in the town of Galena, which has less than 700 residents. However, the Galena Nuclear Power Plant project has been crawling through all sorts of approvals and permits for several years now.

FNPP and Toshiba 4S (illustrations State Atomic Energy Corporation of Russia/Sevmash, Toshiba).

Actually, the inhabitants of Galena are in favor. The city council has repeatedly spoken out in favor of installing the station. This is understandable. Japanese engineers swear that the safety of 4S (stands for, by the way, Super Safe, Small, Simple) is unprecedentedly high (due to the very design features). So fears about the notorious explosion can be put on the farthest shelf and look at the benefits of the undertaking.

Toshiba will supply the reactor for free! She will only take a “rent” from the Galenians for the electricity generated: only 5-13 cents per kilowatt-hour. If we compare it with the current costs of a given settlement for diesel fuel, which is transported far away, the choice becomes clear.

Station 4S should operate for an impressive 30 years without refueling (a metal alloy of uranium, plutonium and zirconium that has previously been tested but never released as a commercial nuclear fuel). By the way, for comparison, floating nuclear power plant reactors will require refueling 12 years after launch.

Toshiba intends to submit an application to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 2009, and if the response is positive, the Alaska plant could come online in 2012 or 2013.

The charity of the Japanese is easily explained - if the project in Galena is successful, Toshiba will try to sell the 4S throughout America.

And the Russian floating nuclear power plant may well be exported (the Cape Verde Islands have already shown interest). By the way, it should be noted that Russian nuclear scientists write: the combination of floating nuclear power plants with a desalination plant is especially promising. Such an autonomous complex would be in demand in many countries.

It is indicative: specialists from Hyperion Power Generation predict a similar use for their mini-reactor.

Hyperion nuclear power plant complete with desalination system (illustration of Hyperion Power Generation).

This company generally considers plants and factories only as one part of the potential buyers of a small nuclear power plant. The residential sector is the second estimated half.

Reducing dependence on imported oil, combating global warming- everything is being used to convince America that the time has come for small nuclear reactors.

And in this impulse, the same Toshiba echoes like-minded people overseas. It is testing a prototype of an even more compact (2 x 6 m) nuclear power plant with a power output of just 200 kilowatts, the Guardian reports. Such an installation could power one home for 40 years.

I’m curious how much they will charge private owners for the removal and disposal of spent nuclear fuel? Can you imagine such a column in the fat from DEZ?

Scientists from the Budker Institute of Nuclear Physics on Monday presented to the public their the latest development– home power nuclear reactor MAES-2014. For the first time in the world, specialists managed to achieve maximum safety with ultra-compact dimensions of the device.

As the project leader, academician Yakov Ioffe, said, the device belongs to the class of so-called Traveling-Wave Reactors. This is the name of this type power plants received due to serious differences from the classical rector scheme - here the nuclear reaction occurs in a very limited region of the core, which gradually moves and behaves like a wave. Development of such a reactor began in the United States in the mid-2000s, but American experts were unable to achieve the predicted behavior of the device.

The Novosibirsk reactor operates on low-enriched uranium, which significantly reduces the cost of the installation. The moderator in the reactor is ordinary water; the device is controlled by a boron carbide control rod. Due to the design features, the critical mass of uranium required to start the reaction is reduced by more than ten times. This, as well as low heat generation, made it possible to achieve an ultra-compact size. The reactor can easily fit in a basement or garage, the developers note.

Tests have shown that the installation is capable of producing electrical power of 0.5 megawatts, which is enough for several dozen households or a small industrial enterprise. The price of nuclear electricity is also quite affordable - the cost per kilowatt-hour is two rubles.

It is especially emphasized that it will not be necessary to obtain special permits to operate the reactor. The device already has dual system security. In case of critical changes in the reactor vessel, the core is immediately filled with a solution of boric acid, which leads to an instant shutdown nuclear reaction. Before launching on the market, the system is planned to be strengthened - to be equipped with a control system that will monitor in real time and send all data via Wi-Fi to the owner’s computer or smartphone.

The rector developed by Novosibirsk scientists can operate for sixty years without recharging. After this, the device will need to be disposed of. This service is planned to be provided at the institute.

The exact cost of the installation has not yet been announced, but scientists are confident that in the future a home nuclear reactor will become available to almost everyone Russian family. A source at the institute said that the reactor could go on sale at a price of 150 thousand rubles. The start of sales is planned for 2016 - after completion of all tests and receipt of certificates confirming the safety of the device.