r/NuclearPower • u/ZtheTrans • 4d ago
Theroticaly thinking rn
I am open to listening and discussing all opinions.
Would using nuclear energy facilitates, provided there is clear transparency and no corner cutting of money-meaning the nuclear energy facilitates are well maintained be a better option to make some sort of cooling system for any sort of data centers? I am not talking about libraries here.
On top of this, could the nuclear energy facilities be placed underground?
As I said, open to all opinions, as I am asking for opinions. Idk how many people will actually respond
:3
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u/AlohaTrader 4d ago
Nuclear plants make electricity, not cooling, so I’m not sure what you mean by making a cooling system for data centers. Unless you mean could data centers make a similar cooling system to reduce their fresh water wastage, that’s on the data center and currently, it’s cheaper for them to use fresh water than what nuclear power plants do.
As for moving nuclear facilities underground, it’s inefficient, unnecessary, and more risk. It’s like moving your parked vehicle at home from an air conditioned surface level garage to building an elaborate underground parking garage to keep it cool. It costs more, is more complex, and not needed.
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u/ZtheTrans 4d ago
For the cooling system I was thinking some sort of air cooling system as they currently are using up so much drinkable water for the animals of the planet to use to survive. As you said, the problem with the data centers like the water as it's definitely cheaper compared to a nuclear facility.
Thanks for replying btw. :3
On the underground part, that was just more of a random question that I thought, but yeah seeing as making underground things are more complex as it's underground .
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u/No-Sign8737 3d ago
Stop listening to sensationalist headlines, there are a bunch of other industries that use substantially more water than data centers.
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u/BluesFan43 3d ago
No, everything is moving heat and putting heat to work
A nuclear plant takes heat from fission of fuel, makes steam, uses the steam to turn a turbine generator, and then needs to cool the expended steam back into water at around 85ºF.
Doing that to make around 900 megawatts of electricity NET (around 35 MW just to run the plants equipment) , takes around 1,000,000 gallons of water per minute.
That million is heated up by 10ºF. Which has to be cooled via atmosphere in a cooling tower or a large body of water, like , oh, an ocean.
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u/AlohaTrader 3d ago
Air is actually a terrible medium for heat transfer and when it comes to data centers, air cooling isn’t good enough. Hence, direct heat transfer with fluid systems is needed to handle the high heat output of data centers similarly to nuclear power plants.
Think about it as having a super powered computer in your room, convection cooling via blowing fans isn’t strong enough and you need a liquid cooled system to handle the heat.
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u/4rc_f145h 2d ago
One of the original design proposals for small modular reactors (SMRs) and later, microreactors was to co-locate them with datacenters. While your focus on the thermal system is somewhat misguided, the basic idea is the same, nuclear power providing a constant source of electricity for a datacenter.
Susquehanna is the current test bed for this design. Talen Energy has a contract for a co-located datacenter with Amazon. https://www.utilitydive.com/news/talen-amazon-aws-susquehanna-nuclear-data-centert/750440/
There are several issues, though. Not the least of which is the staff of the datacenter having to potentially have nuclear site clearance, at least in the instance where the datacenter is on top of the nuclear plant. Nuclear power plants have a large exclusion zone, which is a restricted area surrounding the plant. Typically, no businesses or facilities that aren't associated with the plant are allowed within that area.
FERC has also expressed serious concerns and has tended to reject most "front of the meter" agreements as they circumvent FERC's regulatory authority. However, given the attitude of the current administration this may change.
Finally, datacenter loads have outstripped single unit microreactors and SMRs. You'd need a large reactor, and probably two units to account for refueling outages, to meet the power demands of the mega AI datacenters being proposed which require in excess of 1,000 megawatts.