Think Russia cares a wit what Greenpeace has to say? Nah, me neither.

Russia’s First Floating Nuclear Power Plant Arrives in the Arctic
May 21, 2018 by Reuters


The Russian “Academy Lomonosov”, the world’s first floating nuclear power plant, passes Langeland island, while heading for Murmansk in northwestern Russia, in Denmark, May 4, 2018. Ritzau Scanpix/Tim Kildeborg Jensen/via REUTERS

By Vladimir Soldatkin MOSCOW, May 21 (Reuters) – Russia’s first-floating nuclear power plant arrived in the Arctic port of Murmansk over the weekend in preparation for its maiden mission, providing electricity to an isolated Russian town across the Bering Strait from Alaska.

The state company behind the plant, called the “Akademik Lomonosov,” says it could pioneer a new power source for remote regions of the planet, but green campaigners have expressed concern about the risk of nuclear accidents. Greenpeace has called it the “nuclear Titanic.”

Russian state nuclear company Rosatom, which developed the floating power plant, said that it docked the unit in Murmansk on Saturday where it was towed from St Petersburg, the city where it was built.

In Murmansk it will take on board a supply of nuclear fuel. It will then will be towed to the town of Pevek in the Far Eastern region of Chukotka, separated from the U.S. state of Alaska by the 86-km (53 miles) wide Bering Strait. It will start operations there next year.

The plant will replace a coal-fired power plant and an aging nuclear power plant supplying more than 50,000 people with electricity in Chukotka, Rosatom said.

Rosatom has long planned to launch the sea-borne power units, which, with their mobile, small capacity plants, are best suited to remote regions. It says they can help the environment by reducing greenhouse gas emissions blamed for global warming.

The small plants were designed to make it possible to supply electricity to hard-to-reach areas of Russia. They can operate non-stop without the need for refueling for 3-5 years.

Environmental protection groups, including Greenpeace, have sent a letter to Rosatom boss Alexei Likhachyov demanding strict adherence to safety standards and saying they were watching the floating facility’s development “with great concern.”

The letter calls for full and unrestricted regulatory oversight by the Russian nuclear regulator and an international study into the environmental impact before the reactors are loaded with fuel and tested.

“Nuclear reactors bobbing around the Arctic Ocean will pose a shockingly obvious threat to a fragile environment which is already under enormous pressure from climate change,” Jan Haverkamp, nuclear expert for Greenpeace Central and Eastern Europe, said in a statement last month. (Reporting by Vladimir Soldatkin and Katya Golubkova in Moscow and Geert De Clercq in Brussels)

(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2018.

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Chernobyl 2.0

I am no green peacer but that sounds like a horrible horrible idea.

I'm sure Vegas has an over/under on this thing.

No way this ends well. At some point down the road, this is going to be a disaster.

quote:

Originally posted by tanner:
Chernobyl 2.0

How much damage could a Chernobyl event under water pose?

How is this any different than an aircraft carrier?

d

quote:

Originally posted by caneau:
How is this any different than an aircraft carrier?

Ours or theirs? Oh, they don't have any. Too complex to run for long. The Ruskies seem to have some pretty good engineering. No idea how they can run it.

Seems like a very powerful tool to have at your disposal. I'm a little jealous.

quote:

Russia’s First Floating Nuclear Power Plant Arrives in the Arctic

What could go wrong?

Nevertheless, that thing is pretty cool.

When it comes to Russian machinery, anything more complex than a farm tractor is a disaster waiting to happen. If anyone can fuck this up, they can, and it only takes once.

quote:

Originally posted by rburg:
d

quote:

Originally posted by caneau:
How is this any different than an aircraft carrier?

Ours or theirs? Oh, they don't have any. Too complex to run for long. The Ruskies seem to have some pretty good engineering. No idea how they can run it.

How much sea ice is in the target area? I don’t think we run our aircraft carriers through icy seas, do we?

I actually think it’s a great idea. I’m not against this idea; I wish we had developed one first (aircraft carriers notwithstanding). I say go for it, and let’s learn from it!

We had something similar 50+ years ago:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MH-1A

As someone who has managed engineering and construction in the arctic circle, I have to say this is a horrible idea. Ice has unimaginable forces that crush steel hulls like a soda can. There is a reason why oil & gas builds islands and extends penninsula's into the arctic ocean instead of installing platforms (the industry has even looked at platforms with ice breakers continuously circling).

As far as Green Peace and others of their ilk, I triple dog dare them to try to blockade or board this barge. The Russskies treat "eco warriers" like Somali pirates.

quote:

Originally posted by jbcummings:

quote:

Originally posted by rburg:
d

quote:

Originally posted by caneau:
How is this any different than an aircraft carrier?

Ours or theirs? Oh, they don't have any. Too complex to run for long. The Ruskies seem to have some pretty good engineering. No idea how they can run it.

How much sea ice is in the target area? I don’t think we run our aircraft carriers through icy seas, do we?

I've never heard of any country running an aircraft carrier from Murmansk to the Bering Sea. Doesn't mean it hasn't happened but I've never heard of it.

So instead of mutant irradiated lizards we get what......narwhals? Sea lions?

quote:

Originally posted by Sigmund:
We had something similar 50+ years ago:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MH-1A

I worked with a guy who ran one of those. Interesting stories.

quote:

Russia’s First Floating Nuclear Power Plant Arrives in the Arctic

The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster had irradiated much of the surrounding seas within a certain radius. And that, from a mother nature inspired tidal wave.

This ... will be a great disaster leading to the third option for the question of which was worse, Chernobyl or Fukushima.

Russia has nuclear powered surface ships. They also have nuclear poweeed satellites. I supposed this is the first purely floating nuclear power plant with the expressed purpose of being a power plant and not just to provide power to a ship.

Their technology is very efficient as they don’t spend much of safety features.

For those who asked how bad could it be, it could be very bad. For a U 235 to fission, it must first absorb a neutron that has been attenuated to 2.4 Mev. Once absorbed, it becomes U236 and splits creating energy and some particles including a couple of neutrons which when attenuated, start the next chain of fissions. The more water there is, the more attenuated neutrons there are, the more neutrons, the more fission. Normally, water that attenuates the neutrons heat up and lose their attenuating ability, that ain’t going to happen in the ocean.