Nick Touran

@whatisnuclear.com

2556 Followers 1458 Following

Ph.D./P.E. nuclear engineer and nuclear educator who runs https://whatisnuclear.com. Thinks about how to deliver nuclear power reliably and cheaply, advanced reactors, reactor history, energy.

Chain reaction pic from Duderstadt and Hamilton
Combustion Engineering facility in Chattanooga, TN showing lots of reactor pressure vessels
cooling tower diagram
animations of atom splitting and joining
The Beetle, taken from https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.b4540517&view=1up&seq=293&skin=2021&q1=beetle and cleaned up with AI
list of films being scanned, including: - Umatic - Numatec The Enrichment of Uranium - Managing nuclear waste at the Nevada Test Site - Basalt Waste Isolation Project - VHS - Splitting Atoms - An Electrifying Experience - Martin Marietta Energy Systems Mouse trap -fission chain reaction - Sun of Man - Enriched Uranium - 16-mm - Accident Testing
Moving graph of the neutron kinetics equation being solved live.
Geiger counter clicking on plane on ground and then in air.
model reactor from boy scouts https://archive.org/details/atomicenergy00boys/page/n1/mode/2up
Looking into the BORAX-5 nuclear reactor core
Screenshot of some nuclear films
real control drum design https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015001554800&seq=216&view=1up
beryllium triflute https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015001554800&seq=72&view=1up
core diagram showing rotating control drum mockups from ppa-19
ppa-19 circa 1951 https://doi.org/10.2172/348907
guy pressing two buttons to build LWRs and advanced reactors
text from https://whatisnuclear.com/thorium-myths.html#myth1
Nuclear plant along Lake Michigan with American flag. From Greenwood Cemetery archives
U-235 decay scheme
U-238 decay scheme
Universal MOU between all reactor companies and all customers
Me winning a cp-1 graphite
Bean in Chicago
Photo of me by a sign that says "Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness, Salmon National Forest"
arrow from https://www.energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2018/01/f46/doe-ionizing-radiation-dose-ranges-jan-2018.pdf
radiation dose conversion chart
screen shot from https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/05/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-directs-reform-of-the-nuclear-regulatory-commission/#:~:text=MODERNIZING%20NUCLEAR%20REGULATION%3A%20Today%2C%20President,support%20our%20domestic%20nuclear%20industry.
triso compact in hex pincell with subdivided cubical lattices for speed in openmc.
you're not stuck in traffic. you ARE traffice sign.
TRISO fuel particles packed by openmc
picture of nuclear ship savannah for open house
hex lattice representation of TRISO particles showing cut-offs
initial text from article
Juragua Nuclear Power Plant in Cienfuegos, Cuba
Size comparison for numerous intermediate heat exchangers for sodium nuclear reactors in the US, some of which are extrapolated. source: https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015041125884&seq=387&view=1up
Giant 24-meter diameter concrete reactor vessel
video of rotating plug head at crbrp
table of budget cuts in DOE, from https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Fiscal-Year-2026-Discretionary-Budget-Request.pdf
analysis from LANL showing worst case https://www.lanl.gov/engage/environment/ftwc
Pans over a huge 100 ft. hole dug for the clinch river breeder reactor project.
book cover for the okrent book
CNNC image of CFR-600
Graph showing US nuclear capacity (100 GW) and under construction (0) and China capacity (~60 GW) and under construction (~40 GW).
small scale experiment of glass beads representing pebbles in a pebble bed nuclear reactor. from https://archive.org/details/1964-book-gerwin-atoms-germany-225x-40/page/n122/mode/1up?q=KNK+
an amazing thread from https://x.com/HarksenNiels/status/1913694774344695861
table of all closed-cycle gas turbines, from Closed Cycle Gas Turbines: Operating Experience and Future Potential" by Frutschi, Hans Ulrich
Complete welded turbine rotor of the La Fleur helium turbine (https://archive.org/details/closedcyclegastu0000frut/page/56/mode/1up)
Screenshot from NRC page https://www.nrc.gov/reactors/non-power/new-facility-licensing/hermes2-kairos.html
headline from https://www.neimagazine.com/news/moltex-energy-placed-into-administration/?cf-view&cf-closed
map with dots on it representing reactors
how it started vs how it's going with the expectations from Peach Bottom and the realities of the commercial scale demo that followed at Ft. St. Vrain.
screen shot of text thanking hathi
ML-1 control cab
text reading: "The first design incorporated stagnant fluoride-salt fuel, and it consisted of a cylindrical moderator matrix, made up of the original beryllium oxide blocks, with vertical holes into which small tubes of the fluoride fuel would be placed" from Bettis, The Aircraft Reactor Experiment—Design and Construction, 1957
A bunch of old nuclear video cassettes in VHS and U-Matic format, and 3 reels on 16mm.
flow chart showing reactor lineage from CP-1, LOPO, HYPO, X-10, CP-2, CP-3, The hanford reactors, Clementine, SIR, Seawolf, EBR-1, MTR, STR, Nautilus, and Shippingport