Energy Production
For energy production purposes, one might use a container located inside a solenoid. The container is filled with gaseous uranium hexafluoride, where the uranium is enriched, to a level just short of criticality. Afterward, the uranium hexafluoride is compressed by external means, thus initiating a nuclear chain reaction and a great amount of heat, which in turn causes an expansion of the uranium hexafluoride. Since the UF6 is contained within the vessel, it can't escape and thus compresses elsewhere. The result is a plasma wave moving in the container, and the solenoid converts some of its energy into electricity at an efficiency level of about 20%. In addition, the container must be cooled, and one can extract energy from the coolant by passing it through a heat exchanger and turbine system as in an ordinary thermal power plant.
However, there are enormous problems with corrosion during this arrangement, as the uranium hexafluoride is chemically very reactive.
Read more about this topic: Gaseous Fission Reactor
Famous quotes containing the words energy and/or production:
“In the west, Apollo and Dionysus strive for victory. Apollo makes the boundary lines that are civilization but that lead to convention, constraint, oppression. Dionysus is energy unbound, mad, callous, destructive, wasteful. Apollo is law, history, tradition, the dignity and safety of custom and form. Dionysus is the new, exhilarating but rude, sweeping all away to begin again. Apollo is a tyrant, Dionysus is a vandal.”
—Camille Paglia (b. 1947)
“The production of obscurity in Paris compares to the production of motor cars in Detroit in the great period of American industry.”
—Ernest Gellner (b. 1925)