You know, it’s kind of sad that no one is willing to invest in nuclear energy anymore. Wait, what? NuScale Power celebrated the news of its company-saving $30 million investment from Fluor Corp. Thursday morning with a press conference in Washington, D.C. Fluor is a design, engineering and construction company involved with some 20 plants in the 70s and 80s, but it has not held interest in a nuclear energy company until now. Fluor, which has deep roots in the nuclear industry, is betting big on small-scale nuclear energy with its NuScale investment. "It's become a serious contender in the last decade or so," John Hopkins, [Fluor’s group president in charge of new ventures], said. And that brings us to NuScale, which had run into some dark days – maybe not as dark as, say, Solyndra, but dire enough : Earlier this year, the Securities Exchange Commission filed an action against NuScale's lead investor, The Michael Kenwood Group. The firm "misap
Comments
The nuclear future here will be thermochemical hydrogen used captively to make dimethyl ether, (DME).
This is what we should be pushing for.
DME is much like LPG in its properties, and is more versatile than either gasoline, natural gas, LPG. It's extraordinarily clean and can be made with a nuclear source of primary energy.
NNadir.
DME is consistent with the use of nuclear power for motor fuel manufacture. Arguably nuclear power could be the best option for making the stuff.
DME is the perfect fluid fuel for generation synthetically from hydrogen, since it can be made by hydrogenation of carbon dioxide directly.
I wrote at length about this subject in a diary called "Banning Oil: Dimethyl ether, Hydrogen, Nuclear Power and Motor Fuel for Cars and Trucks."
Here is the link:
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/11/24/195214/27
DME is suitable for use in all gas fired systems, including gas fired turbines that could be used in automotive settings. It runs diesels quite well. It is non-toxic. It has a short lifetime in the atmosphere.
Best of all, it is available conceivably in vast quantities from nuclear energy.
-NNadir