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The Inconvenient TruthAl Gore


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Global Warming is happening now


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nuclear energy will probably beconfirmed in most of today's nuclearcountries as a low carbon energy source

needed to limit imports of oil and gas andto meet fast growing energy needs

Carre previous talk

and everyone puts a brave face on it;sans any other alternative for the past 40years


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but there are otherinconvenient truthsWaste

long-lived fission products andactinides

bury in Yucca Mountain? (now cancelled!)

burn with accelerators?burn in next generation reactors?

store on sitecurrent practice

Weapons Proliferationenrichmentreprocessing


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Probabilistic Risk Assessment (PRA)of Core Damage Frequency (CDF)

E v e n

t s / R e a c

t o r - Y e a r

Safety

SMR claim 10 -8 events per reactor-year

thats 1 event in 1,000,000 reactors over 100 years

is there a credibility issue?


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current prices for electricity(estimated by Black and Veatch, Overland Park, Kansas)

cents/kwhCoal without CO 2 capture 7.8Natural gas at high efficiency 10.6Old nuclear 3.5New nuclear 10.8Wind in stand alone 9.9Wind with the necessary base line back-up 12.1Solar source for steam-driven electricity 21.0Solar voltaic cells; higher than solar steam electricity

*NYT, Sunday (3/29/09) by Matthew Wald

GEM*STAR: 4.5 per kWh with natural uranium fuel

Cost


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Paradigm Shift

ReprocessingThermalReactorsEnrichment

NaturalUranium

FastReactors

GeologicStorage

Liquid FuelRecycling Reactor

Withsupplemental neutrons

Natural uranium orLWR spent fuel

GeologicStorageEnd-of-life waste remnant reduced

by x10 and delayed by centuriesNo enrichment, no reprocessing

GEM STA R


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what would an accelerator based nuclear energy deployment look like

UraniumOre

Enrichment

FuelFabrication

AdvancedBurner

Reactor

FuelSeparation

TransmutationFuel

Fabrication

Fission Products and Process Losses

LightWater

Reactor

High-LevelWasteRepository

Low-LevelWaste

DisposalStorage

Strontium, Cesium and Uranium

TransmutationReprocessing

RecyclingLiquid-fuelSubcritical

Reactor

reduce and defer waste

Fluorination

Accelerator or fusion neutrons

GNEP


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The cost of neutrons has dropped dramatically

1.00E+05

1.00E+06

1.00E+07

1.00E+08

1.00E+09

1.00E+10

1.00E+11

1.00E+12

1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 2020

Year

N e u t r o n c o s t

( $ p e r g r a m

)

Electrosta tic tandemwith stopping lengthdeuterium target

LAMPF withW target

SNS withHg target

GEM*STARwith U target

Electron linac w ithW target

~40 grams of neutrons will produce 1GWe for one year

($432M @ 5 /kWh)


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Proton Driven Sub-Critical System

electric thermaltbeam fissiont

beam beamn f tbeam1 f n t

walla 1 f n tnet electric power out

power on targetelectric wall

walla 1 f n t

1a

t m

Ewall Ebeama Eelectric


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a

Design criteria: large m (fissions per neutron),limiting the need to maximize a (accelerator efficiency)

uranium fuel (un-reprocessed LWR spent fuel is actually better) molten salt eutectic improved neutron utilization & target design

This is what the GEM*STAR project achieves.Results in multiple advantages over existing (orplanned) nuclear energy systems.


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Solid Fuel Issues

volatile fission-product build-upwithin cladding

much more centrallypeaked for driven

systems

non-uniform fuelconsumption

thermal shock due to beam trips (~800 320)


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Molten Salt Eutectic Fuel

ThF 4

UF 4

LiF : UF 4LiF

850

950

1050

750 650

1111 o

1035 o845o

568 o

565 o

500 o

490o

550

Uranium or Thoriumfluorides form eutecticmixture with 7LiF salt.

High boiling point lowvapor pressure

Proven in ORNLMSRE reactorusing ModifiedHastelloy-N(235 U, 239 Pu, 233 U)


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consider a clear liquid which releases heat when

exposed to light, eventually turning a dark purpleInitial fill

with continuous feed-and-bleed beginning here

color and heat output remainsconstant indefinitely

equilibrated isotope fractionsthroughout core and throughout time

increasing light exposure

feed

bleedfast internal mixing

10 -6 less volatile fission-productbuild-up in core


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For 50 years, and even today, people argue for fast-spectrum systems.

Why?

Faster burn-up of heavy actinides.


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But Using Thermal Spectrum0.01 0.2 eV

highest tolerance for fission products: spin structure and resonance spacing reducescapture cross-section at thermal energies:

-fission (239 Pu)-capture (f.p.)

151 Sm (transmuted rapidly to low c nuclei) 135 Xe (continuously removed as a gas)

more than compensates for slower fission ofheavy actinides (which are burned anyway)

~ 100 (vs ~ 10 @ 50 keV)


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extracts many times more fission energy,

without additional long-lived actinides

Feed material:

LWR spent fuel 20 GWy

Acc 1 40 GWy

Acc 2 60 GWy

etc

major reduction and deferral of waste

Relative Wasteafter 2 passes


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Recycling

first pass(40+ years)

second pass(40+ years)

each can be usedto start anotherpre-equililbrated

core every 5 years

subsequent passes (fusion n source?)

40 years worth of LWR spent fuel

under-coreinterim storage




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Existing Proton Beam Power


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Target Considerations

GEM*STAR Internal Target

diffuse (or multiple) beam spots molten salt used for heat removal high neutron yield from uranium

(but minimize target fission) spent target fluorinated and used as fuel

minimize impact on local reactivity


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-0.005

0.000

0.005

0.010

0.015

0.020

0.025

0.030

0

30

60

90

120

150

180

210

240

270

300

330

360

0.00 0.50 1.00 1.50 2.00 2.50 3.00

F l u e n c e

( n / b )

N

e t E l e c

t r i c P o w e r O

u t / P o w e r o n

T a r g e

t

Fissioned Fraction (%)

Fuel: Natural Uranium (MCNPX)

GEM*STAR Split Design

Traditional Graphite (0.6 ppm B)

Fluence

equiv. to a LWRburning 0.5% ofnatural uranium

running at peak gives 91%Pu-239 plutonium

running at x60 gives 70%Pu-239 plutonium


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0.000

0.005

0.010

0.015

0.020

0.025

0.030

0.035

0.040

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

0.00 0.50 1.00 1.50 2.00 2.50 3.00 3.50

F l u e n c e

( n / b )

N e

t E l e c

t r i c P o w e r

/ P o w e r o n

T a r g e

t

Additional Fission Fraction (%)

GEM*STAR split designTraditional Graphite100 * keff + 50Fluence

feed LWRspent fuel

fissionproductfraction

SuperCritical

Fuel: un-reprocessed Light-Water-Reactor spent fuel

running at x140 gives45% Pu-239 plutonium


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High Temperature MSAdvantages over LWRs

no high-pressure containment vessel 34% 44% efficiency for thermal to electric

conversion (low-pressure operation)

match to existing coal-fired turbines, enablesstaged transition for coal plants, addressingpotential cap-and-trade issues

synthetic fuels via modified Fischer-Tropschmethods very attractive (much morerealistic than hydrogen economy)


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What are the obstacles?GEM*STAR uses liquid fuel but NRC is onlycomfortable with solid fuel, despite MSRE successExisting commercial deployed fleet of LWRsEngineers in nuclear industry have little experience withaccelerators; physicists using accelerators have little

experience with nuclear power plants littlecooperation in base programs (vague talk about adistant ATW application)current focus (in US) only on existing and newmodular reactors (scaled down versions of existingdeployed technology)


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advantages seem clearhowever:

DOE NE Report to Congress, April 2010, Nuclear EnergyResearch and Development Roadmap does not include the wordaccelerator even once .

DOE Science (HEP & NP) ADS Report (September 17, 2010) Finding #2: Accelerator-driven sub-critical systems offer the potential for safely

burning fuels which are difficult to incorporate in critical systems, for examplefuel without uranium or thorium . [ WHY not U ??? ]

Finding #3: Accelerator driven subcritical systems can be utilized to efficientlyburn minor actinide waste .

Finding #4: Accelerator driven subcritical systems can be utilized to generatepower from thorium-based fuels

MIT Energy Initiative;OBamas Blue Ribbon Panel 100 year horizon, no new direction, yet continue DOE-NE funding at current level

DOE NE thinking about an ADS demonstration in 2050 (ie, when Im 90 )


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ADS Technology Readiness AssessmentTransmutation

Demonstration

Industrial Scale

Transmutation

Power

GenerationFront End System PerformanceReliability

AcceleratingSystem

RF Structure Development and PerformanceLinac Cost Optimization

ReliabilityRF Plant Performance

Cost Optimization Reliability

Beam Delivery PerformanceTarget Systems Performance

ReliabilityInstrumentationand Control

Performance

Beam Dynamics Emittance/halo growth/beamlossLattice design

Reliability Rapid SCL Fault RecoverySystem Reliability Engineering Analysis

34

Green: ready, Yellow: may be ready, but demonstrationor further analysis is required, Red: more development isrequired.


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Table was based on outdated criteria, permitting modest R&D butdeferring ADS for power to distant future.

helps motivate Intensity Frontier (ie: Project X at Fermilab) ;but higher efficiency via higher-power beams is not a requirement;$100s of millions are going into solar and wind which have far greater outages.

DOE-NE: It takes about 20 years to validate any new fuel system, so 2050

is the earliest one might imagine for ADS.based on input from solid-fuel manufacturers;but consider how this might change if a new system actually addressed waste,proliferation, LWR spent fuel usage, and safety (thus becoming politically,publicly, and financially desirable).

Table 1: Range of Parameters for Accelerator Driven Systems for four missions

described in this whitepaper

Transmutation Demonstration

Industrial Scale

Transmutation

Industrial Scale Power Generation

with Energy Storage

Industrial Scale Power Generation without

Energy Storage Beam Power 12 MW 10 75 MW 10 75 MW 10 75 MW Beam Energy 0.5 3 GeV 12 GeV 12 GeV 12 GeV Beam trips (t > 5 min) < 50/year < 50/year < 50/year < 3/year Availability > 50% > 70% > 80% > 85%


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People (and agencies) are legitimatelyafraid that if they blink theyll lose what

they already have.

How to proceed in this environment?

ARPA-E: nothing nuclear at allNEUP: low relevance

start with liquid transport fuel demonstrationusing other green energy (~$7M);transition it to nuclear (GEM*STAR)


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ADNA (Accelerator Driven Neutron Applications, Inc)

commercial project for liquid transportation fuel generate funds for demonstration facility

GEM*STAR Consortium continue to engage funding agencies and raise

awareness (DOE, ARPA-E, DTRA, NSF, NNSA, Foundations, Federal and State governments, etc) Virginia research facility Powerful motivation for existing and NEW multi-

disciplinary research avenues

Documents

Gem*Star Aps Dnp