The Rickover memo as a Dunning-Kruger effect. https://whatisnuclear.com/news/2025-06-26-nuclear-dunning-kruger.html
| Website | https://whatisnuclear.com |
Nick Touran
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Ph.D. nuclear engineer / advanced reactor designer in Maryland who runs https://whatisnuclear.com. I'm in it to help with climate and energy issues. Grew up in Michigan.
Nuclear-powered, nuclear-armed supersonic ramjet cruise missiles, anyone? Here's a technical 1963 film summarizing component development and subsystem testing supporting just that from Project Pluto https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qMuS5kaDBI
Nuclear-powered Ramjet Cruise Missile: LASV-N1 (Progress Report 1963)
I enjoyed listening to another amazing Decouple podcast episode with Prof Koroush Shirvan from MIT talking about nuclear fuel costs. This is a "must-listen" for all of us trying to make reactors really cheap.
Fuel for Thought
Deep diving energy-dense nuclear fuel
@Possiblydrew "we have daily stand-ups"
Anyone coming to the NRC's RIC conference next week? Registration is free and you can attend online or in person https://www.nrc.gov/public-involve/conference-symposia/ric/index.html
Behold: a 1958 film showing the Armour Research Reactor at the Illinois Institute of Tech. It was a fluid fueled aqueous homogeneous reactor (AHR) built by Atomics International.
Thanks to Brett Rampal and Veriten for sponsoring this digitization!
https://whatisnuclear.com/news/2025-03-06-armour-research-reactor-film-1958.html
Armour Research Reactor – A 1958 film about the first privately owned reactor dedicated to industrial research
The Armour Research Reactor was a small homogeneous-type nuclear reactor with uranyl sulfate fuel dissolved in water. It was installed at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago. This film, recorded in February 1958 and digitized in 2025, shows the core construction, reactor controls, shield, and various applications of the reactor.
Practical Engineering by Robert Pool has lots of interesting things to say about the troubles of US nuclear power.
Wanting to find the "SpaceX of nuclear" is a common goal. But there are some important differences between nuclear enterprise and rockets. Ethan Chaleff explains: https://whatisnuclear.com/news/2025-02-25-a-nuclear-startup-will-probably-not-be-the-next-spacex.html
A nuclear startup will probably not be the next SpaceX – Guest post
For the last decade in nuclear, it’s been in vogue to make comparisons to SpaceX. It’s understandable why: In 2008, launch services were a stilted industry, funded almost entirely by governments and dominated by massive companies operating under cost-plus contracts. In short order, they were disrupted by an upstart, leading to radical price cuts and performance improvements. Who wouldn’t want to replicate that in the nuclear industry?
@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.
See inside the Nuclear Ship Savannah's reactor compartment! Filmed today by Fred Blonder https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiQSek1DJK8
