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Conference Spotlight
Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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Nuclear energy for maritime shipping and coastal applications
The Boston-based Deon Policy Institute has published a white paper that examines the applications of nuclear energy in the maritime sector—specifically, floating nuclear power plants and nuclear propulsion for commercial vessels. Topics covered include available technologies, preliminary cost estimates, and a status update on the regulatory framework.
Unique opportunity: The paper points out that nuclear energy has the potential to benefit the shipping industry with high energy efficiency, lower operating costs, and zero carbon emissions. The report has a special focus on Greece, a nation that controls about 20 percent of the global commercial fleet and thus has an opportunity to take a leading role in the transition to nuclear-powered shipping.
Rei Kimura, Satoshi Wada
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 193 | Number 9 | September 2019 | Pages 1013-1022
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295639.2019.1576454
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A small modular reactor (SMR) is a promising candidate for future nuclear energy; therefore, many organizations are developing SMRs. Some SMRs have a power output higher than 100 MW(electric). This paper, however, describes a much smaller reactor of less than 10-MW(electric) power output: a microreactor. The microreactor shares the same advantages as SMRs, i.e., passive safety, portability, and maintainability. This paper studies a calcium hydride (CaH2) heat pipe–cooled reactor in which heat pipes and CaH2 accomplish passive removal of generated heat, fuel inventory reduction, high-temperature operation, and prevention of a loss-of-coolant accident. The CaH2 allows operation at a core temperature of 800°C, which improves the efficiency of the reactor system. In the case of moderator function loss, hydrogen dissociation may occur at the higher temperature; however, negative temperature reactivity of the hydride-moderated core prevents reactor runaway. The negative temperature reactivity is realized by the poison nuclides 113Cd and 151Eu, which have a capture resonance peak at thermal energies in high-temperature operation. It was confirmed that the proposed method is capable of controlling the reactor over the whole burnup period.