Nick TouranFeb 23, 2025
See inside the Nuclear Ship Savannah's reactor compartment! Filmed today by Fred Blonder https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiQSek1DJK8
Inside the Nuclear Ship Savannah's Reactor Compartment

YouTube
Show threadpublius

@whatisnuclear

SAVANNAH should be equipped with a modern nuclear powerplant and returned to service, to her initial purposes of (a) a floating exhibit of the peaceful uses of atomic energy, and (b) a pathfinder for future nuclear merchant ships.

A reactor-heated gas turbine derived from the HTRE-1 and GE 630A would be a very good choice.

Feb 23, 2025 at 3:56amWeb
Show threadNick TouranFeb 23, 2025
@publius good idea overall. We might want to use a closed cycle gas turbine, closer to ML-1 rather than open-cycle HTRE-1 which was crazy radioactive during operation.
Show threadpubliusFeb 23, 2025

@whatisnuclear

Closed-cycle gas turbine is what I had assumed, using nitrogen as the working fluid (thanks to Rod Adams for that atomic insight), which allows using standard air turbomachinery instead of having to develop machinery for helium.

I would keep the water-moderated pressure-tube structure common to HTRE-1 and ML-1, but use TRISO fuel, probably with a corrugated surface, rather than the highly-enriched metallic fuel developed for the jet engine.