Forget security (which worries me less), the legalities of this are notoriously tricky (especially if the ship might ever leave the waters of one nation), and the economics are even worse.
I wouldn’t touch civil maritime nuclear with a barge pole, and if I did, the clear win is decarbonizing big cargo ships.
Agreed, the largest container ships put out some serious pollution, going nuclear (a decades old proven technology for shipping) would be a massive improvement
But the people championing nuclear data centers are not trying to solve climate change
I've worked on a few big EPC projects in a specialised industrial sector, including some in the UK. Three things drive the first digit of cost, assuming you've hired relatively competent engineers and constructors:
1. (Design) Building floorplate and architectural complexity (i.e., divergence from 'big box')
2. (Construction) Schedule adherence. Almost any one-off expense to stick to the schedule is worth it, but to your point, these are often challenged or delayed. Building and testing equipment on skids off-site is almost always worth it.
3. (Design/Commissioning) Schedule adherence. For commissioning this is typically driven by design choices (did you pick a high-TRL process, or if not, do all the work required to mature it in parallel to construction?) and by building the right commissioning team (knows their job, knows the plant).
If more expensive plant & equipment gets you ahead on any of these 3, 99% of the time that is an overall optimisation.
I was once working on a one off build and also on a smaller build at the same time. The smaller build was built start to finish as per the plans, the larger one was choices all the way.
The net result, we topped out and roofed the big house, then built the small house in its entirety while the owners of the big house chose their windows. Add that in favour of waterfall design...
Permitting and regulation is generally a sub-component to each of the three things mentioned, and can be a major factor in schedule adherence for large scale construction projects. Whether that is the primary impediment or not is often a factor of the specifics of the project (and its design) and the overall environment. During major events (e.g. COVID), materials access and availability was a far more challenging aspect of schedule adherence for most large projects than any other factor.
I've never worked in this field as the GP, but I have family that do and I've heard plenty of stories and made my own observations, but definitely take my two cents with plenty of salt. Maybe GP will reply also.
A week late but... in my experience (potentially sector/location specific but I don't think so), most high-risk licensing and permitting activities come before construction starts, and certainly almost always before above-ground construction starts. So regulatory issues may challenge overall project viability, but you tend to know before cash is sunk if you're going to be, for instance, refused planning permission.
Up to 30 days to set, and depending on the type of lime (hydraulic or non-hydraulic) and form/process (putty, hot mix, etc.) up to a year to reach full hardness.
One thing I do miss from the early internet was less anonymity being the norm on Usenet/forums/etc. Discussions tend to stay more civil when both parties know there's a "real" person on the other end.
Otherwise, my memory of early 90s internet supports exactly your conclusion. There may have been better opportunities for small discussions, but big ones devolved the same way they do today.
For a counterpoint, you only need to look at the cancer that is Facebook comments from people on their own name and face and a lot of bio attached. It's not the anonymity. At least not by itself.
Yes. It's a little different between England & Wales, Scotland, and NI, but public rights of way (footpaths and bridleways) are very much a thing.
My experience is that it works well in general, but some landowners are better than others, and some highway authorities (which enforce the laws) are more zealous than others. Most of the issues I see around me is farmers allowing crops to grow through low use footpaths such that they become impassable.
The other tricky bit of PRoWs is that any path used by the public for 20 years continuously, without force, secrecy, or the landowner's permission, is legally presumed to be a public right of way, even if it isn't shown on the definitive map kept by the local authority. That can lead to legal fights e.g. [1] and [2]. There are also 'permissive footpaths' where landowners have agreed to allow the public to pass, but not become a PRoW. There are also s106 agreements (planning obligations) where developers must allow the public to use land as a footpath. The Thames Path has a mix of these.
In Scotland, there is a more general 'right to roam' which allows anybody to access most land (excepting buildings and their curtilages, military sites, and other obvious exceptions), but there are affirmative duties to maintain PRoWs that don't apply to open access land making them still relevant. England and Wales have some limited open access land as well, but much much less of it. NI has no open access land and (subjectively) fewer public footpaths.
No, it isn't. It is called 'City of London Corporation' in the sense of being a municipal corporation, but effectively it's just a local authority... except that businesses still get a vote along with citizens.
Their SNM license was for “up to 93.5% enriched”[1] and their decommissioning plan describes them as MTR-type Al-clad plates. So I’d take a reasonable guess that these are at 93% nominal enrichment, like ATR and HFIR fuel plates.
Respectfully, have you ever actually read an NTSB report? They're incredibly thorough and consider both causes and contributing factors through a number of lenses with an exclusive focus on preventing accidents from occurring.
Also, they're basically inadmissible in court [49 U.S.C.§1154(b)] so are useless for determining financial liability.
I wouldn’t touch civil maritime nuclear with a barge pole, and if I did, the clear win is decarbonizing big cargo ships.