The RBMC design was always known to be an absolutely terrible idea because it's use of graphite as a moderator that required active cooling, creating an inherently unsafe positive void coefficient[1].
In fact, this was such a problem that there was concern before the disaster that the ~60 seconds the emergency diesel pumps would require before they could pump enough coolant would not be fast enough to protect the reactor if the main electric pumps failed. The "test" that was being conducted at the time of the disaster (and was the direct cause of the reactor going prompt-critical) was a shockingly foolish attempt to let the momentum of the electrical turbines (without any input steam) continue to power the pumps and keep the coolant flowing for a few seconds to fill that gap in time while the diesel pumps got up to speed[1].
Chernobyl was never a sane design, and no other power plant design - before or after - has such a blatant disregard for safety. Unfortunately, Soviet politics and the desire to keep their nuclear weapons program secret kept these problems from reaching the people with the power to do anything about it.
> designed subsequent plants to be much more safe
Absolutely. We had safer designs decades ago (and even better ideas[2] today), but upgrading to these safer designs has been hindered at every step by radiophobic activists and "not in my backyard" politics. So we're stuck with minor revisions (if any) to reactors designs from the 50s-70s.
If the general public viewed the computer industry like they perceive the nuclear industry, the average person would know vaguely that the discovery of the transistor was probably very useful, while being concerned that computers took up far too much space and burned out vacuum tubes far to often.
> Absolutely. We had safer designs decades ago (and even better ideas[2] today), but upgrading to these safer designs has been hindered at every step by radiophobic activists and "not in my backyard" politics. So we're stuck with minor revisions (if any) to reactors designs from the 50s-70s.
There are still countries investing in nuclear energy, like China, and I suppose these new reactors are made to the latest norms of safety.
> I suppose these new reactors are made to the latest norms of safety
They are, the Chinese are buying reactors like the AP1000 which is quite possibly the safest production-level certified reactor ever designed by humanity (and no I'm not a Westinghouse employee, I've just had a nuke "interest" for about thirty years).
Its almost comical in some sad ways... I've read reasonable predictions that in a decade the entire Chinese national "fleet" will have a total aggregate incident rate for an entire country below some individual antique American reactors. Absolutely tragic.
The RBMC design was always known to be an absolutely terrible idea because it's use of graphite as a moderator that required active cooling, creating an inherently unsafe positive void coefficient[1].
In fact, this was such a problem that there was concern before the disaster that the ~60 seconds the emergency diesel pumps would require before they could pump enough coolant would not be fast enough to protect the reactor if the main electric pumps failed. The "test" that was being conducted at the time of the disaster (and was the direct cause of the reactor going prompt-critical) was a shockingly foolish attempt to let the momentum of the electrical turbines (without any input steam) continue to power the pumps and keep the coolant flowing for a few seconds to fill that gap in time while the diesel pumps got up to speed[1].
Chernobyl was never a sane design, and no other power plant design - before or after - has such a blatant disregard for safety. Unfortunately, Soviet politics and the desire to keep their nuclear weapons program secret kept these problems from reaching the people with the power to do anything about it.
> designed subsequent plants to be much more safe
Absolutely. We had safer designs decades ago (and even better ideas[2] today), but upgrading to these safer designs has been hindered at every step by radiophobic activists and "not in my backyard" politics. So we're stuck with minor revisions (if any) to reactors designs from the 50s-70s.
If the general public viewed the computer industry like they perceive the nuclear industry, the average person would know vaguely that the discovery of the transistor was probably very useful, while being concerned that computers took up far too much space and burned out vacuum tubes far to often.
[1] http://www.hiroshimasyndrome.com/chernobyl.html
[2] http://thoriumremix.com/th/