[0.11.x] Uranium Power

[Liquius]

As for weapons, I don't want to dive too far into that (for now). I only added the bullets as a way to use the depleted uranium.

Breeder reactors. Most of the potential energy of uranium is in the U-238, you just have to transmute it into a fissile isotope first.

Then we get into all the fun of reprocessing, MOX fuel, and a new way to deal with that pesky biter colony.

However, before that I need to rework my fission reactors so that fuel assemblies deteriorate. I want to attempt to add modular reactors at the same time. It depends on how brave I feel and how much spare time I get (I do have nice chunk of time over xmas, so that's probably when it will happen).

[katyal]

Modular reactor!!!! Hehe I realise it would be more difficult to implement but really would be something new and interesting.

[CreeperDaReeper]

However, before that I need to rework my fission reactors so that fuel assemblies deteriorate. I want to attempt to add modular reactors at the same time. It depends on how brave I feel and how much spare time I get (I do have nice chunk of time over xmas, so that's probably when it will happen).

Modular reactor!!!! Hehe I realise it would be more difficult to implement but really would be something new and interesting.

Found this pic a while back somewhere in these forums. Hope it helps.

[Zeeth_Kyrah]

I've been using this mod in my latest game, and it is actually quite fun. I have a series of chemical plants with storage tanks in between for enrichment (with the lower-value stuff looping back to previous tanks), and as long as there is a final output that leaves the system, they don't seem to clog up if I don't let the first tank (0.7%) overfill. I added the Smart Circuit Systems mod and a smart tank (a pipe which measures liquid amount and temperature) and some smart inserters combine nicely to manage that problem.

I'd like to suggest making the fuel assemblies into tools instead of modules (since tools have damage values, and degrade when used), and changing the slot type in your reactor from module slots to inventory or tool slots. Then each tick your reactor would reduce the damage value of the stack in each slot by the amount your control rods (if any) are pulled out (so your fuel will last longer if it's "burning" slower). Since you're also thinking of changing from a single-building reactor to a multi-part structure (YAAAAY!) I think that should help quite a lot. Addressing the production problem, since water can heat up in a boiler and cool off over a long-distance pipeline, it's clear that fluids can change temperature per pipe or structure they pass through, so all you have to do is code the heat exchanger structure to add heat based on how enriched the fuel stacks are inside it, or leave the temperature alone if nothing is inside.

[Fatmice]

Hello, there is a play index bug when you mine the fission reactor. If you press Ok after the message, you will crash, but if you press Esc, you won't and can continue to play.

[AartBluestoke]

idea: a grenade type weapon that does "a bit" of damage to the "target" (and perhaps an area around it), but releases a whole lot of pollution (1000 or so, enough to trigger a nest to spawn) ... Good for busting big bases, but at a cost ...

Also, don't be too afraid of producing a high end power plant that cost 100x solar panel and only produces 150x the output or so ... there is a huge space saving which can be considered ... at higher levels a smaller perimeter is quite a bit nicer to defend...

[Liquius]

Hello, there is a play index bug when you mine the fission reactor. If you press Ok after the message, you will crash, but if you press Esc, you won't and can continue to play.

That's odd, I haven't been able to recreate this. Are you running 0.11.5? Is it single player or multiplayer?

[Liquius]

I have pushed out another release. It should work for the latest update. This also includes fixed fluid colours, and a minor balance tweak (lower level fuel assemblies are less powerful).

[Fatmice]

Hello, there is a play index bug when you mine the fission reactor. If you press Ok after the message, you will crash, but if you press Esc, you won't and can continue to play.

That's odd, I haven't been able to recreate this. Are you running 0.11.5? Is it single player or multiplayer?

Hi, it is a multiplayer game but you can just load it into local game and the error will still occur. It still happens in the newest release. I'm giving you the save game and mods. You should be next to the fission reactor when you load in.

Simply mine it and the error message will appear. If you click "Ok," you will crash. If you press Esc on the keyboard, you will not crash.

http://www.mediafire.com/download/ju8m1 ... 10-new.zip
http://www.mediafire.com/download/hvkl2 ... ds-new.zip

[The Lone Wolfling]

Does anyone have any numbers as to how many steam plants a nuclear plant with speed bonus <whatever> can run, and how much water it uses?

I'm trying to design a power plant that's vaguely balanced in terms of ratios.

[Fatmice]

Does anyone have any numbers as to how many steam plants a nuclear plant with speed bonus <whatever> can run, and how much water it uses?

I'm trying to design a power plant that's vaguely balanced in terms of ratios.

A fully decked out nuclear plant can provide ~16MW of generation, that's approximately 29.4 steam generators so you will need 3 offshore pumps. You can get away with 30 if you use a storage tank to store superheated water, but 29 will be stable indefinitely.

Generation_a.jpg (506.88 KiB) Viewed 10139 times

Generation_b.jpg (632.95 KiB) Viewed 10139 times

[Degraine]

Regarding fuel assemblies as modules, I haven't investigated module mechanics closely myself, but couldn't you create a new category for them, since each building that accepts modules has an explicit list of what types of modules can be inserted into them?

I also think you could steal^H^H^H^H^Hborrow an idea from IC2 and make a Stirling-based generator that just outputs a small, constant amount of power forever from processed fuel pellets.

[The Lone Wolfling]

Does anyone have any numbers as to how many steam plants a nuclear plant with speed bonus <whatever> can run, and how much water it uses?

I'm trying to design a power plant that's vaguely balanced in terms of ratios.

A fully decked out nuclear plant can provide ~16MW of generation, that's approximately 29.4 steam generators so you will need 3 offshore pumps. You can get away with 30 if you use a storage tank to store superheated water, but 29 will be stable indefinitely.

Good to know, thanks.

How many steam engines in a row can be supplied, do you know? And what about non-maxed-out plants?

[cpy]

Those pellets with 500% speed boost is not what i expected
I was hoping for reactor that actually produce toxic waste and eat uranium (processed)
Even fuel pellets don't last forever.

[Fatmice]

How many steam engines in a row can be supplied, do you know? And what about non-maxed-out plants?

I don't know about lower tiered fuel assemblies as I never used them. I always enriched to 3.5%. Each steam engine eats 6 units of water / tick so if you line them up end to end, they would still consume that much. The problem is that water throughput drop with distance from source, so I would guess the max you can do is 30 engines end-to-end with 3 off-shore pumps providing at the head.

Those pellets with 500% speed boost is not what i expected
I was hoping for reactor that actually produce toxic waste and eat uranium (processed)
Even fuel pellets don't last forever.

I think the author expressed that he will look into making them decay into depleted uranium but haven't gotten time to do that yet. However, real fuel rods lasts a long long time. Lets look at physics before we complain hm?

A pound of U-235 has energy content of ~ 3.7x10^13 J (37 GJ). We're using 3.5% pellets, say ignoring what kind of reactor this mod is modeling as that affects generation, so only 3.5% of 37GJ or 1.295 GJ per pound. Now, I'm going assume that these "pellets" are actually fuel assemblies, and that we have 4 of them slotted into each reactor. Let us assume that each assembly has 500 Kg of fissionable materials, a reasonable lower bound, => 2000 Kg for four => 4409 pounds => 5710 GJ of energy.

Given maximum generation is 16 MW for 4x3.5% "pellets", you will wear out those "pellets" in 356,875 seconds of continuous use. This is 4.13 real days. If we had lowered our assumption to 100 Kg of fissionable materials, then 4x3.5% "pellets" would still last a whooping 19.8 hours of real time. In terms of game play, this is effectively forever.

About the speed boost, it's just a gimmick to make superheated water. I suppose he could have gone another route of making the the pellets a fuel-type, but then that would mean you can burn them in a normal boiler, which makes no sense. An alternative, maybe, is to use an oil-building prototype, and that the pellets is a modified oil-drum. The pellets would then have a fix amount of "oil" to be converted to superheated water. The conversion rate would then need to be changed to a fixed +2000% for the reactor building. Maybe this will work.

[cpy]

5710 GJ of energy vs infinite (now). That is a bit different, don't you think?
Ok let's forget the fact that you need to balance 2 loops and everything is automated, and power output is average.
Let's forget the whole thing (simplified): http://www.nuclearpowersimulator.com/
Spoiler for easy start on that simulator

54-74-74

Still we're talking about infinite power source, not even solar power is infinite (provided you can live that long). Uranium is really good source of power, but making it infinite is not a good start. I mean yeah author did real good job about mod but the power generation itself is sketchy. Probably mod API does not allow it yet but we'll have to see.

Didn't factorio makers say that they will make nuclear reactors one day?

[Degraine]

There's already a portable fusion reactor, so I'd imagine yes.

[Fatmice]

5710 GJ of energy vs infinite (now). That is a bit different, don't you think?
Ok let's forget the fact that you need to balance 2 loops and everything is automated, and power output is average.
Let's forget the whole thing (simplified): http://www.nuclearpowersimulator.com/
Spoiler for easy start on that simulator

54-74-74

Still we're talking about infinite power source, not even solar power is infinite (provided you can live that long). Uranium is really good source of power, but making it infinite is not a good start. I mean yeah author did real good job about mod but the power generation itself is sketchy. Probably mod API does not allow it yet but we'll have to see.

Didn't factorio makers say that they will make nuclear reactors one day?

Don't use the mod then if you don't like infinite power. For that matter, don't use solar panels either because it is infinite power as far as I'm concerned in this simulation. Or, tweak it yourself. Now that's a concept, and maybe share your work once you're done. Meh.

[cpy]

I don't know how to mod this game.

[Liquius]

Those pellets with 500% speed boost is not what i expected
I was hoping for reactor that actually produce toxic waste and eat uranium (processed)
Even fuel pellets don't last forever.

That is the long term plan. By next week I should become a lot less busy and hopefully I will spend a decent amount of time working on this (and completely reworking the reactor).

In real life fuel assemblies generally last between 6-24 months depending on the reactor. Fresh fuel assemblies are cycled in as spent ones are cycled out and you don't replace them all at once.

Didn't factorio makers say that they will make nuclear reactors one day?

It's something that I imagine they would do, but I doubt they would do it up to my level of realism/detail (still got a long way to go).