Nuclear Power from a Nuclear Engineer

[afk2minute]

i really like the idea of player not beign able to pick up radioactive stuff.
Something new, but not breaking main game design, very, very nice.

[Rhamphoryncus]

Well the waste could be recycled intofuel again through adequate processing. I'm not a specialist, but I know we use MOX nuclear plants in Europe, that are able to generate electricity with what's considered as waste, and I bellieve there are fast reactors that can burn a lot more things and leave far less waste. I also know that used plutonium can be reprocessed to become fuel for a nuclear plant again. There is no need nuclear implemented in Factorio is 100% accurate, but there is plenty of room for waste reprocessing/recycling mechanisms to kick in.

Technically the fuel to waste ratio on all reactors is about 1 to 1, but a fast neutron reactor gets on the order of 10x as much energy out of the fuel so it uses 10% as much, which naturally means 10% as much waste.

Unfortunately even in a fast neutron reactor the percentage of non-fissionable products that act as neutron poisons will get too high and you'll be unable to further burn the fuel without pulling it out, separating the true waste from the partially burnt (fissionable) products, then throwing the useful stuff back in. The true waste at that point is just boring stuff like like lead-206 or lead-207, although in practice there's still trace contamination of radioactives that make you treat the lead as nuclear waste.

If you weren't concerned with nuclear proliferation (diversion of purified fissibles towards weapons) you could probably design a reactor that would internally recycle fuel, with the only output being true waste. That means you can ignore waste for gameplay, it's still realistic.

[bobucles]

Where's the fun with internally recycling fuel? That sounds like a job for more factory.

[Fushigidane]

So many fact errors. The true waste are the highly radioactive fission products that you unavoidably get from fission. The total radioactivity from those is directly proportional to the energy produced and the only way to deal with them is to put them in a safe place for 1000 years or so. The useful part of the waste is the actinides and they represent a fairly small part of the radioactivity during the first 1000 years.

[bobucles]

The true waste are the highly radioactive fission products that you unavoidably get from fission.

What? You mean like the core containment building up waste radiation over time? Because anything that's pumping out radiation is making heat, and anything that's cooking can still make energy.

This is also a sci fi future where energy shields absorb the impact of 50 ton trains blasting away at full speed. A few stray gamma rays aren't gonna hurt anyone. Just put a few 100kw shields in your core containment and let the megawatts pour in.

There's nothing wrong with making a few things up for the sake of focusing on gameplay. We have a few hundred years of tech both real and imaginary to play with.

[Fushigidane]

Fission products are the radioisotopes that result from splitting a nuclei, like cesium and strontium After a while they don't produce useful amounts of heat but the gammas will still kill you in a heartbeat. They also build up a lot of pressure in the fuel so it's not like you can just put all of it back in the reactor.

Ofc you can just explain it away by having everything stored on site as I believe is the practice in American reactors among others.

[vipm23]

No need to poison the player to death. Picking up a hazardous item can just cause an injury effect and have the attempt fail. That means only containers and bots can handle the material.

Keeping it out of player hands means another puzzle to solve.

I think the poisoning would work better for gameplay.
The player would still want to handle waste with containers and bots, but if it's an emergency he can hoof the stuff if he's quick about it.

[Durabys]

I am amazed that in a thread about nuclear power with an actual nuclear engineer present nobody has mentioned the LFTR/Liquid Fluoride (Salt) Thorium Reactor (this video is worth watching, just 5 minutes where everything is explained about why Thorium is better) and the mod by Homusubi:

viewtopic.php?f=94&t=23224&hilit=Thunder+stone

Factorio Mods link

Thunder Stone - Basic Thorium and Rare Earth Mod (Initial Alpha)

I saw that there was a uranium mod already out there, and since thorium > uranium in every way bar atomic number, I decided to make a thorium mod.

Features

New ore: monazite, rarer than copper but not as rare as oil. Bright green in Factorio. Not bright green in real life (proving that, if there is a Creator, he/she/it can be boring sometimes).
Two new metals: Thorium and Rare Earth, both obtained by combining monazite ore and sulphuric acid in a chemical plant. Note: monazite cannot be smelted.
Thorium reactor: specifically a liquid fuel thorium reactor. Acts as a boiler by converting liquid thorium fuel (made from thorium metal and water) and normal water to produce boiling water, which can then be used in steam engines. Thorium reactors do not produce any pollution.
Rare earth: Advanced Circuits and Processor Units now require 1 rare earth metal plate each.

The thorium reactor, along with the monazite/thorium processing recipes, are unlocked with the Thorium Processing technology, which requires 100 red and green science packs and prior knowledge of Fluid Handling.



Credit to Klonan for the oil steam boiler that forms the basis of the thorium reactor, and to DaveMcW for pointing me in the direction of Klonan's resource at the crucial moment.

[afk2minute]

I am amazed that in a thread about nuclear power with an actual nuclear engineer present nobody has mentioned the LFTR/Liquid Fluoride (Salt) Thorium Reactor (this video is worth watching, just 5 minutes where everything is explained about why Thorium is better) and the mod by Homusubi

You have to understand that it doesnt matter how its called: uranium, thorium or some fantastic material.
We are not playing real life, we are playing factorio and all these "realistic and better" (if they are so) numbers will anyway be corrected for balance issues.
It doesnt matter which values are going to be corrected - uranium numbers or thorium.

[BeCurieUs]

Ya, thorium, uranium, doesn't matter. It is all about reactors in real life. No offence to thorium boosters, but most things on the internet about new technology are basically vast oversells, thorium no different.

Thorium, from a gameplay perspective would be not much different than uranium. Still have a heat source, likely attached to some kind of steam network. Have to manage fuel inventories, have to manage waste (maybe), ect. Uranium/breeder cycle could be used if you want to simulate the most popular (but also least realworld) molten salt, thorium reactor (LFTR). A problem from the realism perspective of a pure thorium breeder is a lack of an ability to have a fissile start load. Thorium has no fissile, naturally occurring isotopes, you would need a uranium235 initial charge, or breeder some thorium->via some kind of neutron bream (hella inefficient). So from a realism perspective, STARTING with a thorium breeder is about the worst idea! And being that it doesn't have much in the way of interesting mechanics over a breeder cycle in uranium, and uranium has a much more realistic starting mode with abilities to bring in advancements later on down the line, I dunno, hard to see thorium figuring in much. Not knocking it, just saying realism wise, no bueno, gameplay wise, not much different than uranium breeder cycle.

Ok, diverting back to some other ideas. I think I have finally come to the conclusion that the idea of "waste storage" is just not needed. Most things in the game reward the player for making a choice to go "deeper" into the tech tree. As such, it seems like the best way to reward a player for going deeper into nuclear tech tree is to treat "waste" as a valuable commodity....something we WANT rather than something we put in a box and shoot with a shotgun. Similar to moving oil via barrels, we want those barrels back!

There are ways to do this with waste as well, either do what the mod I posted on the first page does, and make it part of a fuel cycle that makes fuel and a bit of depleted uranium....not a bad option, but the DU could be removed and not much lost. The factory would need a sulfuric acid and steel, but use less of the sulfuric acid to reward players for recycling and investing, make it the same for how little as the best yield uranium ore would use, maybe even less?! Maybe also have to mix it with some regular fuel as well, but yields back more units than the sum of its parts? Like 1 fuel and 1 spent fuel = 3 fuel...pays to recycle! This quazi-simulates the breeder cycle where you are turning more and more of the uranium238 into usable Pu239. In reality this is usually a losing proposition breeding wise, but hey, it is just a game after all.

This gives us both automation, rewarding complexity without being overly complex itself, and a healthy amount of realism. Once again, the mod on the first page gets most of this right, thought I would want to devs to balance the numbers a bit more.

Also, many uranium ores are, in fact, green whereby many thorium ores are not. So that is totally a plus

Of note, this method produces a bit of pollution via factories, like the sulfuric acid part, the fuel fabrication part, and the resources used to make the plant part. That is all pretty true to life. What we lose in realism, though, is dealing with the fission product waste. I actually think this is "ok" if maybe the factory reprocessing the fuel produces a bit more pollution or something (I guess you could simulate that by making the process longer, right)? I dunno, the idea of managing the nuclear waste sounds like a boring element. Only way I could see it as fun is if we agree that the isotopes in nuclear waste can be used in science (which in a lot of cases they can be) or, after a period of time, turn into blue science, or something like that. Reward the player for hanging onto it and managing it and in a way that is pretty close to reality as many isotopes in spent fuel could be very useful to science (we currently don't really extract them, though).

On that note, you don't actually need a new centrifuge unit, could just be a factory....I just like the idea of a chain of centrifuges....but that might be to complex.

(Edit: Part of me REALLY likes the idea of a factory turning nuclear waste into blue science kind like alien artifacts do. After all, waste is just a resource you aren't smart enough to use, yet. Maybe a couple of advanced science things can make you be able to do this, dunno, what do yall think?)

[vipm23]

On the subject of nuclear waste:

What if, if a box of nuclear waste gets shotgunned, it releases tons of radioactive fallout?
It'd act like pollution, except it also damages players and biters in it based on concentration.

Probably needs a carrot to go with the stick, but it does make the problem more difficult than "just shoot it away."

[BeCurieUs]

Ya, that has been suggested but it also is one of the few forms of pollution that wouldn't make much since to create. I mean, storage space is SUPER easy, so just storing infinity waste is easy as pie. As such, you don't want to use the stick here, but the carrot. Make waste, if waste is going to exist, some kind of resource we use for some other process. This is both true to life (mostly) and true to the spirit of the game.

[aeros1]

Lots of stuff to read through! I wanted to talk about adding some inflexibility to nuclear power. Everything else provides X energy exactly as needed. What if nuclear had a fixed output? Failing to use the energy could cause problems, and sudden needs can cause shortages.

One possibility is that a nuke reactor takes several days to "warm up" to full output. As the fuel ages the output steadily decreases until it's time to shut down and refuel.

I like this idea, it is close to realism as usualy to manuever with power output on atomic plant is costly and long process requiring some stuff preparation and usually not done often. Same goes with power degradation. Though atomic stations have several reactors on cycle output/input so there is no large power failure. Though there are close cycle reactors nower days, so maybe reinrichment or cycle of two reactors using different kind of ores till fuel doesn't loses it's radioactive properties and becomes just stone or sand.(Though maybe with advanced reactors)

Also ups for radiation effect(aka damage maybe debuff) if you unprotected by radio suit. Shields might protect but would drain quickly.

Also reactors may have quite evolutionary effect on biters nearby. IT is unnecessary if reactor is in building because radioactive emmissions inside even building are not that large as reactor is isolated.

[afk2minute]

Lots of stuff to read through! I wanted to talk about adding some inflexibility to nuclear power. Everything else provides X energy exactly as needed. What if nuclear had a fixed output? Failing to use the energy could cause problems, and sudden needs can cause shortages.

One possibility is that a nuke reactor takes several days to "warm up" to full output. As the fuel ages the output steadily decreases until it's time to shut down and refuel.

I like this idea, it is close to realism as usualy to manuever with power output on atomic plant is costly and long process requiring some stuff preparation and usually not done often. Same goes with power degradation. Though atomic stations have several reactors on cycle output/input so there is no large power failure. Though there are close cycle reactors nower days, so maybe reinrichment or cycle of two reactors using different kind of ores till fuel doesn't loses it's radioactive properties and becomes just stone or sand.(Though maybe with advanced reactors)

Also ups for radiation effect(aka damage maybe debuff) if you unprotected by radio suit. Shields might protect but would drain quickly.

Also reactors may have quite evolutionary effect on biters nearby. IT is unnecessary if reactor is in building because radioactive emmissions inside even building are not that large as reactor is isolated.

I just cant understand all this radiation suit stuff.
You are talking about some degree of realism and still vote up for things like "radiation suit" that can protect from VERY high radiation levels (if it can cause damage within such low exposure time, it should be really really high). If they are so high then you need a bunker to hide, not some laughable suit (not to say this suit can become radioactive itself from such an exposure).

Radiation suit main purpose is to prevent inhaling radioactive gases\dust (internal radiation is much more dangerous) and prevent direct contact with your skin. Guess what is power armor + breathing apparathus + space suit you have are for?

[BlakeMW]

I just cant understand all this radiation suit stuff.

That's why I like the idea that the energy shield can protect from radiation. Shields are not bound by the laws of physics, they work by magic. If a shield can protect from bites, acid, fire and lasers it should be able to protect from radiation too.

Also perhaps the heavier armors could provide a measure of radiation resistance, it is perfectly reasonable, after all radiation shielding is mainly just mass and given Power Armor 2 has tank-like resistances it must have pretty thick plating. I'm thinking maybe something like 50% radiation resist for Power Armor MK2, which is not going to save you if you're taking heavy radiation damage, but it would make work easier for the energy shield.

Note: Factorio Guy also clearly has healing factor, this would allow him to recover from radiation poisoning which would kill a normal human. There could even be an in-universe justification in that he's a space traveller, an enhanced ability to repair DNA/Cellular damage may be a prerequisite to interstellar travel due to damage from galactic cosmic rays.

[BeCurieUs]

The inability to quickly modulate power is a myth, actually. Plants have been quickly modulating load in France as a course of business for decades, we just don't do it in the US for....reasons (see, not good ones). You can read about that in a crusty OECD report here if you wish, most of you won't wish I am sure

https://www.oecd-nea.org/ndd/reports/20 ... ng-npp.pdf

To that end, though, it is usually doing something like venting steam at the exchanger, so water use per unit energy wouldn't really decrease, just the power output, which could be a fun enough mechanic I guess.

[afk2minute]

I just cant understand all this radiation suit stuff.

That's why I like the idea that the energy shield can protect from radiation. Shields are not bound by the laws of physics, they work by magic. If a shield can protect from bites, acid, fire and lasers it should be able to protect from radiation too.

Also perhaps the heavier armors could provide a measure of radiation resistance, it is perfectly reasonable, after all radiation shielding is mainly just mass and given Power Armor 2 has tank-like resistances it must have pretty thick plating. I'm thinking maybe something like 50% radiation resist for Power Armor MK2, which is not going to save you if you're taking heavy radiation damage, but it would make work easier for the energy shield.

Note: Factorio Guy also clearly has healing factor, this would allow him to recover from radiation poisoning which would kill a normal human. There could even be an in-universe justification in that he's a space traveller, an enhanced ability to repair DNA/Cellular damage may be a prerequisite to interstellar travel due to damage from galactic cosmic rays.

Shields are pretty good idea, if there is actually need of introducing protection from radiation (and the damage from it etc) i prefer shields over other options.

[vipm23]

To that end, though, it is usually doing something like venting steam at the exchanger, so water use per unit energy wouldn't really decrease, just the power output, which could be a fun enough mechanic I guess.

Which side of the exchanger? We could use the pump to simulate this if it's on the power generation side-just pump excess hot water out of the loop.
Of course, this only works if we can read pipes...

[bobucles]

To that end, though, it is usually doing something like venting steam at the exchanger, so water use per unit energy wouldn't really decrease, just the power output, which could be a fun enough mechanic I guess.

What you are suggesting is basically throwing the extra heat away so it doesn't overload the generator. The idea of "cooling towers" was to provide a method of blowing away excess energy to prevent a reactor from overheating. It is a good idea for nuclear power, as it provides a way to ease the difficulty of building a 100% perfect nuclear system. A player can just waste a little excess energy in safety, and nuclear can be balanced around the idea that sometimes you just throw fuel away.

It is still VERY difficult to crank a nuclear reaction up or down at a whim. Why should it be easy? The nuclear material is always decaying and always there. The only way to stop the reaction is to pull the material OUT, or otherwise poison the reactor by absorbing the excess neutrons. Depending on how aggressive you are with neutron absorption you could very well contaminate the fuel so it can't crank up properly any more, or even bring it to a hard stop. In either case you've made a problem that has to be solved before the plant can be fully active again.

High output, requires automation, and a potential for considerable efficiency loss or power outages if the player isn't careful. It is relatively easy to get started, has strong tools to make it manageable(cooling towers, power switches, accus, combinators, etc.), and is very difficult to make totally perfect. Those all sound like good design goals for a high tier energy system.

[BeCurieUs]

So I have spent most of the day playing with the already existing mod I mentioned on the homepage. I like it, gets most everything right, spare it is a little TOO complicated I think. A more streamlined version would surely be pretty good. I recommend trying out the mod and see what yall think. It already does some smart things that address most of what has been brought up here, with a few questionable things in it.