Support - Uranium Power

[Demosthenex]

I apologize, but I'm having the same problem reverse engineering the 500 MW reactor design. Things are crammed together too tightly and the temperatures too similar to distinguish your loops and piping. As you know the lack of labels in Factorio make understanding someone else's piping a pain (I recommend the Sticky Note mod...).

You said there were three loops. The first loop appears to be a closed loop between the reactor and large HE's with tanks for buffering. This then feeds heat to a second closed loop between two HEs with a tank for buffering, but the loop isn't a single contiguous loop. The inputs and outputs are shared, so cold and hot are mixing? Can you help me understand why?

The last loop is not a closed loop as you are pumping in new PW, but like the second loop it appears to be mixing the inputs and outputs. That is still confusing.

Are you using mixing input cold water and output hot water as a method to increase the temperature of the final product? I suppose a feedback loop of sorts helps there, as the water only reaches equilibrium (warm) when mixing hot and cold.

I'm surprised you are feeding pressurized water to the engines, as I thought we had to exchange heat from PW to W before pumping it there. Do they get good performance off 350C PW?

In my game I won't reach the recirculating pumps and cooling towers for quite a while (Bob+Angel+Marathon), and my own experience is that I can't get more than 3MW from a 250MW reactor using the heat exchangers and pumps. I've tried several designs now with several loops, and tried the wall style and recipe style HEs.

Could you help explain how to properly use the HE's to obtain power?

[Demosthenex]

To reply to myself, I think I found the critical part. I was not using a feedback loop, or a recirculating loop, with my heat exchangers. Once I set the HE's with loops I was able to move around heat extremely easily!

Here's a labelled album to demonstrate the concept. Feel free to reuse in your documentation and maybe credit me?

https://imgur.com/a/dYYow

[Fatmice]

I apologize, but I'm having the same problem reverse engineering the 500 MW reactor design. Things are crammed together too tightly and the temperatures too similar to distinguish your loops and piping. As you know the lack of labels in Factorio make understanding someone else's piping a pain (I recommend the Sticky Note mod...).

Interesting, I'll take a look at that mod. It makes labels in the world I gather?

You said there were three loops. The first loop appears to be a closed loop between the reactor and large HE's with tanks for buffering. This then feeds heat to a second closed loop between two HEs with a tank for buffering, but the loop isn't a single contiguous loop. The inputs and outputs are shared, so cold and hot are mixing? Can you help me understand why?

The last loop is not a closed loop as you are pumping in new PW, but like the second loop it appears to be mixing the inputs and outputs. That is still confusing.

Are you using mixing input cold water and output hot water as a method to increase the temperature of the final product? I suppose a feedback loop of sorts helps there, as the water only reaches equilibrium (warm) when mixing hot and cold.

Reactor input and output

Inner loop

Screenshot from 2017-02-13 18-34-46.png (2.08 MiB) Viewed 11456 times

• Blue is the liquid/heat returning tranche. It supports three of the six inner tranches.
• Red is the liquid/heat departing tranche. It also supports three of the six inner tranches.
• The setup is point symmetry so the lower left is a mirror of the upper right.
• The tanks are used for buffering and to provide independent ouputs/inputs since each connection of a tank has independent throughput.

Intermediate loop and final output

Intermediate loop and output

Screenshot from 2017-02-13 18-34-52.png (2.09 MiB) Viewed 11456 times

• The red and yellow arrows show the direction of the inner loop.
• The orange arrows are for the intermediate loop. This loop is special in that it always work regardless of the state of the output, pink and blue. The primary job of this loop is to buffer the heat transfer between the inner and output. This is why it has a special by-pass pump and is connected to a tank instead of directly to the output heat exchanger. The pump is also there to force-feed the intermediate heat exchanger with liquid from the tank and from the output of the final heat exchanger. This is important as quick filling of the "input side" and draining of the "return" on the "output side" promote excellent heat exchanger performance. The temperature in the tank will fluctuate depending on the load on the grid but due to the by-pass pump the fluctuation will be very smooth, which is a good thing for the final heat exchanger.
• The blue and pink arrows are for the output. It is a semi-loop as it also has a by-pass so that the heat is buffered in the tank. Note that I've calculated the liquid flux so that input (blue) always exceeds demand (pink). The wire connected to the tank is so I can shut off the off-shore pumps to control the duty cycle of the pressurisers. The output tank can not completely fill or the final heat exchanger will stop working.

I'm surprised you are feeding pressurized water to the engines, as I thought we had to exchange heat from PW to W before pumping it there. Do they get good performance off 350C PW?

I had to use pressurised-water because of water was an insufficient heat carrier. It's one of those pesky heat bottlenecking issue due to maximal fluid transfer rate limit in Factorio. Vanilla steam-engines aren't picky on what sort of fluid you feed them as long as it carries heat. As a bonus, they also operate at 106% their stated max-performance if they are fed a liquid with more than 85 degrees of heat above the liquid's "standard" temp. In fact, the hotter the liquid, the less of it they will consume. This is excellent for conserving liquid throughput and delaying the inevitable maximal fluid transfer rate limit. Even with this optimization, I had to break the heat transfer from the reactor into six separate tranches.

To reply to myself, I think I found the critical part. I was not using a feedback loop, or a recirculating loop, with my heat exchangers. Once I set the HE's with loops I was able to move around heat extremely easily!

Here's a labelled album to demonstrate the concept. Feel free to reuse in your documentation and maybe credit me?

https://imgur.com/a/dYYow

Nicely done. I'll add the reference.

[obuw]

I've got a question - how are you supposed to get depleted fuel rods? I've put some fuel rods in my reactors and in a few cases they got depleted pretty much within a minute, but the new batch I have placed have lasted days and still above 90%. We've tried 4.7% as well as 1.7% rods. We just can't get them to deplete. (We want them to deplete so we can build nukes).

We even had a "fuel rod depletion" setup separate from out main network that ran like two dozen radars, but no luck, rods are still above 90%.

[Demosthenex]

I've got a question - how are you supposed to get depleted fuel rods? I've put some fuel rods in my reactors and in a few cases they got depleted pretty much within a minute, but the new batch I have placed have lasted days and still above 90%. We've tried 4.7% as well as 1.7% rods. We just can't get them to deplete. (We want them to deplete so we can build nukes).

We even had a "fuel rod depletion" setup separate from out main network that ran like two dozen radars, but no luck, rods are still above 90%.

So I've noticed that if I remove all the rods by hand, they preserve their "damage" value. If I remove the reactor, I receive all new rods.

While I've been tinkering so much, I haven't had any deplete. Once it runs... they start to deplete. I have a handful already but it's slow depending on the output. I'm slowly making uranite ore from water (water to Angel's slag, to liquid slag, filtered to uranite). I hear there are low yield processes for seawater, and this is slow too. So I appreciate the slow pace of the fuel, but it must decay.

In the mean time I've seen my rods drop to 80% running 60 MW when I have it full, and I've exhausted my first few when I had single ones in it. I also use solar during the day, and UP at night so my duty cycle is lower.

I'm having a hell of a time trying to get power out of a 250MW. I've topped out at 60 MW of Bob's MK2 engines before it won't take any more load. To be fair I'm transferring power to water, and Fatmice was suggesting using pressurized water straight to the engines. I may try that next and see if I can get 120 MW of real power from the 250 (50-60% engine efficiency).

When I do, I'll share my build like the last one on Imgur.

[Light]

I've got a question - how are you supposed to get depleted fuel rods? I've put some fuel rods in my reactors and in a few cases they got depleted pretty much within a minute, but the new batch I have placed have lasted days and still above 90%. We've tried 4.7% as well as 1.7% rods. We just can't get them to deplete. (We want them to deplete so we can build nukes).

We even had a "fuel rod depletion" setup separate from out main network that ran like two dozen radars, but no luck, rods are still above 90%.

Rods deplete faster or slower depending on the load of the reactor and number of rods in the chest.
Here's one such example.

A reactor with 15 rods and one with 6 rods, 4.7% at 100% production for as long as it takes for the shutdown.

Reactor - 15 Rods
10:49 1 Rod (14)
10:51 1 Rod (13)
10:54 2 Rods (11)
10:59 1 Rod (10)
11:03 3 Rods (7)
11:06 1 Rod (6)
11:10 6 Rods (0)
11:10 Reactor Shutdown

Reactor - 6 Rods
4:19 2 Rods (4)
4:20 1 Rod (3)
4:20 Reactor Shutdown

So in this example you'll see that 2 rods died in the 6 rod reactor at 4:19, compared to the 15 rod reactor which took 10:49 to start depleting.

If you want to exhaust your rods quickly, set your reactor to only use 6 rods and ramp up the power drain so they deplete in just a few hours. More rods means more distribution of decay and thus far slower to deplete, so a 500MW reactor chest distributing decay among 25 rods will take over a day before depleting. (This is a good thing of course)

[Fatmice]

I've got a question - how are you supposed to get depleted fuel rods?

The rod's life get used up as heat is expended.

I've put some fuel rods in my reactors and in a few cases they got depleted pretty much within a minute,

I'd like to know how you got them to deplete within a minute.

but the new batch I have placed have lasted days and still above 90%. We've tried 4.7% as well as 1.7% rods. We just can't get them to deplete. (We want them to deplete so we can build nukes).
We even had a "fuel rod depletion" setup separate from out main network that ran like two dozen radars, but no luck, rods are still above 90%.

I guess you are not stressing them enough. They take quite some beating to deplete. Which reactor are you using to do this?

So I've noticed that if I remove all the rods by hand, they preserve their "damage" value. If I remove the reactor, I receive all new rods.

That's a bug that's fixed in 0.6.7. Don't abuse it too much.

While I've been tinkering so much, I haven't had any deplete. Once it runs... they start to deplete. I have a handful already but it's slow depending on the output. I'm slowly making uranite ore from water (water to Angel's slag, to liquid slag, filtered to uranite). I hear there are low yield processes for seawater, and this is slow too. So I appreciate the slow pace of the fuel, but it must decay.

In the mean time I've seen my rods drop to 80% running 60 MW when I have it full, and I've exhausted my first few when I had single ones in it. I also use solar during the day, and UP at night so my duty cycle is lower.

I'm having a hell of a time trying to get power out of a 250MW. I've topped out at 60 MW of Bob's MK2 engines before it won't take any more load. To be fair I'm transferring power to water, and Fatmice was suggesting using pressurized water straight to the engines. I may try that next and see if I can get 120 MW of real power from the 250 (50-60% engine efficiency).

When I do, I'll share my build like the last one on Imgur.

You can get ~38% out of the 250 MW so that's ~95 MW

[obuw]

I'd like to know how you got them to deplete within a minute.

I'm not really sure. First I was using a 4.7% rod, left it in the reactor for a good while and it was still 98-99% when I got back. Then I took it out and put a 1.7% rod in there to see if it decays any faster, then a few minutes later I got back and boom, it was depleted. Then I got another rod depleted within a few minutes. So I figured 1.7% rods must be the way to go if you want to get waste materials faster. But now all the new 1.7% rods I've put in have been decaying incredibly slowly so I'm not sure how the first few got depleted so fast.

I guess you are not stressing them enough. They take quite some beating to deplete. Which reactor are you using to do this?

I was using the small reactor with steam engines using up about 8-10kW worth of steam in this test.

I think it would be nice if there was a choice between a more "dirty" and "efficient" setup, with one setup producing waste a lot faster while the other setup lasts longer like the ones we have now. Could be through the fuel rods (e.g. make 1.7% rods decay quickly but produce the same waste as a 4.7% rod) or through some other method; like putting multiple rods in a reactor could increase its reactivity making it produce more power per rod, so you'd put 1 rod to deplete it quickly, or fill it up to get exponentially more bang for your buck.

I dunno, I guess I'm a bit spoiled from playing several nuclear power mods in minecraft in the past. :p

[Light]

Given how powerful the nukes are, it makes sense you couldn't just mass produce them in a few minutes.

I've personally locked all my 250MW chests to just 6 rods and after a few hours I have enough waste products to nuke several dozen nests. But given their power and time to create, you shouldn't be wasting them unless the nest is massive and couldn't be taken down normally.

So in that sense, I'd say it's perfectly balanced as is. If it were even easier to create nukes then all combat options would be obsolete and the decision to use a nuke wouldn't matter since you have enough to wipe the map twice over.

[obuw]

Hey, if it's taking a few hours to have several dozen nukes then it's perfectly fine. Our small reactor has been running for days and none of our rods are even budging below 90%. So we must be doing something wrong. I'd just like to be able to try one nuke before we get to the end of the game. Hence why I was asking about how you are supposed to deplete your rods.

So, just to be sure: Does it matter how many rods you have in your reactor? Say, if 1 rod decays in 1 hour, then will putting 10 rods mean they will finish decaying in 10 hours?

[Light]

Hey, if it's taking a few hours to have several dozen nukes then it's perfectly fine. Our small reactor has been running for days and none of our rods are even budging below 90%. So we must be doing something wrong. I'd just like to be able to try one nuke before we get to the end of the game. Hence why I was asking about how you are supposed to deplete your rods.

So, just to be sure: Does it matter how many rods you have in your reactor? Say, if 1 rod decays in 1 hour, then will putting 10 rods mean they will finish decaying in 10 hours?

As mentioned earlier, the rod decay is distributed between the rods randomly, so some rods may decay faster than others but overall it will be slower.

Now considering you want to isolate a reactor for the express purpose of burning rods, I'd suggest adding this mod.
https://mods.factorio.com/mods/binbinhfr/ElectricVoid

Here's how it would look like when in use.


The electrical producer is connected only to the poles feeding the recirculation pumps so it won't shut down (Cyan Line). The electrical equalizer is connected only to the poles connected to the two turbines so they burn steam at 100% (Yellow Line). Shift left clicking the power poles will remove the wires so you can separate the poles from each other so this works.

Using this setup will deplete 6 rods in around 4+ hours, but just remember to keep the pole connections separate and the flow of water constant so it can keep running. You can also do this without the mod if you feel like it, but for ease of getting this to work it's preferable given the vast amount of power you'll need to drain.

Update: Setting the chest to only use 1 rod will deplete it in 10 minutes! The only change required is to have pipes providing water directly to the cold leg instead of the source tank.

[Nexela]

You don't even need an additional mod

Make an isolated reactor setup with just 1 fuel rod in.

Add a bunch of radars to it. In about 15 mins or so you will have 1 spent rod

[Fatmice]

Hey, if it's taking a few hours to have several dozen nukes then it's perfectly fine. Our small reactor has been running for days and none of our rods are even budging below 90%. So we must be doing something wrong. I'd just like to be able to try one nuke before we get to the end of the game. Hence why I was asking about how you are supposed to deplete your rods.

So, just to be sure: Does it matter how many rods you have in your reactor? Say, if 1 rod decays in 1 hour, then will putting 10 rods mean they will finish decaying in 10 hours?

If you fill the 250 MW chest with 7x 4.7% and run it at its max of ~94MW, then roughly 6-8 hours before all of those rods will deplete. Though your reactor will sputter and won't be able to keep up when one of the rod deplete.

I'm not really sure. First I was using a 4.7% rod, left it in the reactor for a good while and it was still 98-99% when I got back. Then I took it out and put a 1.7% rod in there to see if it decays any faster, then a few minutes later I got back and boom, it was depleted. Then I got another rod depleted within a few minutes. So I figured 1.7% rods must be the way to go if you want to get waste materials faster. But now all the new 1.7% rods I've put in have been decaying incredibly slowly so I'm not sure how the first few got depleted so fast.

What you've witness is not that the rods inexplicably decay faster. It may not be clear to the player, but the rods decay linearly with time, albeit randomly, and power output. If there are twice as many rods, then on average, it will take twice a long to completely deplete. A good example to relate the rate is the example of filling and emptying a funnel. When the funnel is filled to the top then allowed to empty, the rate of emptying is constant, but the rate of volume contraction gets faster and faster. It is infinite when that last drop leaves the funnel. This is visually similar to what you saw, a sudden uptick in the appearance of depleted fuel rods. As more rods turn into depleted rods, there are fewer viable rods to choose from for heat extraction and thus those remaining rods wear out even faster.

I guess you are not stressing them enough. They take quite some beating to deplete. Which reactor are you using to do this?

I was using the small reactor with steam engines using up about 8-10kW worth of steam in this test.

8-10kW of steam? I'm quite perplex. That's not a unit I'm familiar with. Are you talking about units of steam or units of power?

I think it would be nice if there was a choice between a more "dirty" and "efficient" setup, with one setup producing waste a lot faster while the other setup lasts longer like the ones we have now. Could be through the fuel rods (e.g. make 1.7% rods decay quickly but produce the same waste as a 4.7% rod)

The 1.7% do deplete faster than the 4.7%. This is because there is less fissionable material in the former than the latter. The amount of waste has to be less. It's a simple mass balance. You can't have less reactivity leading to more waste. The MOX is the dirtiest. Run single rod in isolated setup and you should get plenty of wastes. I've seen people complain about wastes in Reika's mod, but here we are actually complaining that there isn't enough. I find it really funny.

or through some other method; like putting multiple rods in a reactor could increase its reactivity making it produce more power per rod, so you'd put 1 rod to deplete it quickly, or fill it up to get exponentially more bang for your buck.
I dunno, I guess I'm a bit spoiled from playing several nuclear power mods in minecraft in the past. :p

Well variety is a spice of life. Regarding reactivity, I do plan to allow that happening but the onus will be on you... You'll have to wait until 0.15 hit us in the face though. Too many things will be broken with that release and I can't afford to introduce the big PWR only to rewrite it from scratch when 0.15 hit. What you guys have been asking for is safety vs performance and that you're a big boy and can deal with the repercussion of unsafe reactor. Well I have news for you, the big PWR will deliver and don't tell me I didn't warn you about running it past safety margins.

The little ones, 250 MW, 500 MW will always be safe. They're not really meant to make materials for what you call nukes. That thing is better called a dirty bomb. A real nuke is planned and you can't make it unless you have a breeder reactor.

My main focus is releasing 0.6.7, which I'm planning on doing this weekend with pre-release to work out any bugs. Then add circuit to the current reactor so you guys can control them within the game's own mechanism. I'm not a fan of GUI though I may work to get some GUI in for a master controller type building for you managerial types out there, who always like to have tabs on everything from one place. Also I can improve upon some aspect of the mod like a little help with building placement.

Update: Setting the chest to only use 1 rod will deplete it in 10 minutes! The only change required is to have pipes providing water directly to the cold leg instead of the source tank.

I'm going to make the turbine shutdown if the low-pressure steam is clogged. You guys are always out to abuse.

You don't even need an additional mod

Make an isolated reactor setup with just 1 fuel rod in.

Add a bunch of radars to it. In about 15 mins or so you will have 1 spent rod

Maybe I should make it so that you can't run the reactor with 1 rod.

Then again, it takes effort to get at the wastes. Also, you should know you are throwing potential energy away when you turn the wastes into that nuke shell. The breeder reactor will be able to convert much of that "so call" wastes into energy. This will be needed since enrichment will take longer and you will have to use up far more Uraninite to get to where you are today with starting up a reactor and sustaining it. I'm very keen on making closed fuel cycle a reality, though an open cycle is will still be possible but you will have to expend more resources in the long run.

[obuw]

As mentioned earlier, the rod decay is distributed between the rods randomly, so some rods may decay faster than others but overall it will be slower.

Now considering you want to isolate a reactor for the express purpose of burning rods, I'd suggest adding this mod.
https://mods.factorio.com/mods/binbinhfr/ElectricVoid

~snip~

Using this setup will deplete 6 rods in around 4+ hours, but just remember to keep the pole connections separate and the flow of water constant so it can keep running. You can also do this without the mod if you feel like it, but for ease of getting this to work it's preferable given the vast amount of power you'll need to drain.

Update: Setting the chest to only use 1 rod will deplete it in 10 minutes! The only change required is to have pipes providing water directly to the cold leg instead of the source tank.

Okay so I wanted to learn whether the decay is just distributed randomly, or you get more total power per rod. Here you are saying you get 4+ hours out of 6 rods, but only 10 minutes from a single rod? Was that just because you were wrong about your first estimation (4+ hours from 6 rods)? So 6 rods would deplete in 1 hour if 1 rod depletes in 10 minutes? Or wait, does adding more rods increase the max output of the reactor? In which case, if you're voiding the electricity, 6 rods should still deplete in 10 minutes?

I don't like the idea of that electricvoid btw, it kinda feels like cheating.

If you fill the 250 MW chest with 7x 4.7% and run it at its max of ~94MW, then roughly 6-8 hours before all of those rods will deplete. Though your reactor will sputter and won't be able to keep up when one of the rod deplete.

~snip~

What you've witness is not that the rods inexplicably decay faster. It may not be clear to the player, but the rods decay linearly with time, albeit randomly, and power output. If there are twice as many rods, then on average, it will take twice a long to completely deplete. A good example to relate the rate is the example of filling and emptying a funnel. When the funnel is filled to the top then allowed to empty, the rate of emptying is constant, but the rate of volume contraction gets faster and faster. It is infinite when that last drop leaves the funnel. This is visually similar to what you saw, a sudden uptick in the appearance of depleted fuel rods. As more rods turn into depleted rods, there are fewer viable rods to choose from for heat extraction and thus those remaining rods wear out even faster.

~snip~

8-10kW of steam? I'm quite perplex. That's not a unit I'm familiar with. Are you talking about units of steam or units of power?

~snip

The 1.7% do deplete faster than the 4.7%. This is because there is less fissionable material in the former than the latter. The amount of waste has to be less. It's a simple mass balance. You can't have less reactivity leading to more waste. The MOX is the dirtiest. Run single rod in isolated setup and you should get plenty of wastes. I've seen people complain about wastes in Reika's mod, but here we are actually complaining that there isn't enough. I find it really funny.

Okay, so let me get this straight; The reactor's max power output scales with the number of rods in it? So if I put a single 4.7% in it, the max rate would be ~13MW?

With "10kW worth of steam" I just meant I'm spending 10kW of power.

I do understand the 1.7% deplete faster and the amount of waste is less overall, I just wanted to know if the "amount of waste per fissionable material" is higher. Now I'm not an expert on nuclear power by any means, but I think you can have more waste with less reactivity if the material you use simply "less pure"? But from what you're saying, I guess the MOX rods are the way to go when it comes to "amount of waste per fissionable material"?

[Light]

As mentioned earlier, the rod decay is distributed between the rods randomly, so some rods may decay faster than others but overall it will be slower.

Now considering you want to isolate a reactor for the express purpose of burning rods, I'd suggest adding this mod.
https://mods.factorio.com/mods/binbinhfr/ElectricVoid

~snip~

Using this setup will deplete 6 rods in around 4+ hours, but just remember to keep the pole connections separate and the flow of water constant so it can keep running. You can also do this without the mod if you feel like it, but for ease of getting this to work it's preferable given the vast amount of power you'll need to drain.

Update: Setting the chest to only use 1 rod will deplete it in 10 minutes! The only change required is to have pipes providing water directly to the cold leg instead of the source tank.

Okay so I wanted to learn whether the decay is just distributed randomly, or you get more total power per rod. Here you are saying you get 4+ hours out of 6 rods, but only 10 minutes from a single rod? Was that just because you were wrong about your first estimation (4+ hours from 6 rods)? So 6 rods would deplete in 1 hour if 1 rod depletes in 10 minutes? Or wait, does adding more rods increase the max output of the reactor? In which case, if you're voiding the electricity, 6 rods should still deplete in 10 minutes?

You still don't seem to get it. The rod is not responsible for power, it's responsible for HEAT.

The single rod in the reactor is struggling to keep the reactor above 300°C, the values are sporadic between 288°C and 304°C every second and the steam generators activate for a fraction of a second because the heat is fluctuating too much to remain constant. Because of this, the rod is generating as much HEAT as it can by itself and is unable to keep it steady, thus it's being consumed at a rapid pace.

The 6 rods in the reactor are generating a stable 349°C of heat despite the 100% load the turbines are going through. The fluctuations in temperature are minimal and thus it's a more stable system capable of sustaining the steam generators at full capacity. Because the amount of heat is being replenished so rapidly compared to the single rod reactor, the decay rate is very little in comparison and so they're lasting longer.

The 4.7% rod generates more heat than the 1.7% rod, which is why more 1.7% rods are needed to sustain a reactor at 350°C. (13 to be exact) Which is why if your reactor temperature is fluctuating too much, you need either stronger rods or more than what's in the chest already to keep it stable, otherwise they're going to decay faster and the whole system will shut down as it stops producing enough steam.

It's this stability in rapidly replenishing the heat in the reactor that allows the rods to decay slower. This is why a chest of more than 6 rods doesn't actually do anything since the heat is already stable at 349°C; Its only purpose at that point is to distribute the decay among more rods to slow it down as much as it did in my test example above.

[Fatmice]

Okay, so let me get this straight; The reactor's max power output scales with the number of rods in it?

Yes. 15x4.7% rods in a 250 MW reactor can put out 262.85 MW of heat. Similarly, 15xMOX in a 250 MW reactor can put out 295.04 MW of heat. This is heat output, not usable power output, which is only ~38% of the heat output.

So if I put a single 4.7% in it, the max rate would be ~13MW?

Not quite. The heat output of any rod depends on the reactor it is used in. A single 4.7% rod in the 250 MW reactor outputs a different amount of heat than when used the 500 MW reactor. For 250 MW reactor, a single 4.7% rod outputs 17.52 MW of heat.

With "10kW worth of steam" I just meant I'm spending 10kW of power.

That's too little power being expended for you to see any appreciable dent in the life of the rods. I'm perplexed that you expected otherwise?

I do understand the 1.7% deplete faster and the amount of waste is less overall, I just wanted to know if the "amount of waste per fissionable material" is higher. Now I'm not an expert on nuclear power by any means, but I think you can have more waste with less reactivity if the material you use simply "less pure"? But from what you're saying, I guess the MOX rods are the way to go when it comes to "amount of waste per fissionable material"?

The wastes scale with enrichment. Wastes here are fission products, not material made radioactive from exposure to neutron bombardment. "Less pure" fuel would generate less heat, has less reactivity, and so less wastes. MOX is the way to go if you want more wastes to play with.

[obuw]

~snip

Okay, once I figured out that the decay is related to the whole temperature equilibrium thing, I let the reactor cool down to below 300 degrees and then put a single 1.7% rod in it. Sure enough, it depleted in <10 seconds. I've just used up all my 1.7% rods which should give me plenty of waste for now, thanks for the help!

Yes. 15x4.7% rods in a 250 MW reactor can put out 262.85 MW of heat. Similarly, 15xMOX in a 250 MW reactor can put out 295.04 MW of heat. This is heat output, not usable power output, which is only ~38% of the heat output.

Great, things make much more sense now. I think it would really help if some of this info was in the description of the mod.

PS. Why is the usable output only 38% of the heat output, I thought steam generators are 100% efficient? Or is this the efficiency of the reactor itself? e.g. 100MW of heat produces steam carrying 38MW of heat while 62MW dissipates into air?

That's too little power being expended for you to see any appreciable dent in the life of the rods. I'm perplexed that you expected otherwise?

I was expecting a bunch of 1.7% rods to at least noticeably decay within a few days, but now that I realize decay is more related to temperature equilibrium I definitely think the decay rate is fine.

The wastes scale with enrichment. Wastes here are fission products, not material made radioactive from exposure to neutron bombardment. "Less pure" fuel would generate less heat, has less reactivity, and so less wastes. MOX is the way to go if you want more wastes to play with.

Okay got it, do we have numbers on this? I'm curious now. Maybe I'll check the mod files.

[cpy]

Anyone knows best lag free setup of reactors? Because 16 250MW reactors start to show quite a lot on script time. We need lot of power and thought this mod would solve it, but it made stuff worse

[Fatmice]

Anyone knows best lag free setup of reactors? Because 16 250MW reactors start to show quite a lot on script time. We need lot of power and thought this mod would solve it, but it made stuff worse

Hm, you needed 2 GW of power? At that point, you need to optimize more than just power. Many things will start to eat ups, certainly 16 250 MW reactors won't help you there, nor will 10 of the 500 MW reactors. Perhaps I should look to increase the output of the 500 MW but I do not think I can stretch it much further due to heat flow issues.

PS. Why is the usable output only 38% of the heat output, I thought steam generators are 100% efficient? Or is this the efficiency of the reactor itself? e.g. 100MW of heat produces steam carrying 38MW of heat while 62MW dissipates into air?

Mainly due to the thermal efficiency of the Rankine cycle. The steam generator is 100% efficient, but only in the mod. Real ones are at best 80% efficient. Heat transfer from reactor cores to the primary coolant is at best 50% efficient. The turbines are at most 95% efficient. Then there is heat loss due to phase transition and condensation. The effective efficiency comes to be about 36-38%. The rest of the heat is indeed lost to the environment to drive the heat cycle. In the mod, I cap the heat production of the reactor to simulate this.

[cpy]

When you play marathon mod you need big production lines to progress and solve high flow logistics and uranium power is 10% of whole update time. If game update was threaded and maybe one day it will, it won't be problem at all since multiple cores are way more powerful than just one core. MInecraft can be theaded and was done by Nallar (TickThreading) who made minecraft servers run 10-100x faster by doing multithreading and heavy optimizations (Mojang is nothing compared to him). So i know that things can be threaded but it's hard to do and not everyone can do it.

Yeah but i bet those belts are UPS killers.