For a vessel the size of a container ship, mounting an SMR (Small Modular Reactor) directly to power it would likely result in less energy loss.

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cenamus 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

Not even the Russians could decommission their nuclear subs properly. I'm relatively sure that random semi-shading shipping companies wouldn't either.

In a perfect world however... endless cooling water unless they're in some shallow harbor. Would be the perfect application.

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mschuster91 3 days ago | parent [-]

> In a perfect world however... endless cooling water unless they're in some shallow harbor. Would be the perfect application.

Still not, because all it takes is one thing going Seriously Fucking Wrong on another ship and boom, you got yourself a nuclear disaster. Just look at the Francis Scott Key Bridge and imagine that that ship hadn't hit a bridge support but a nuclear powered vessel.

Nuclear powered ships only make sense for ships operating in places where there is no other ship in sight for hundreds of miles (i.e. icebreakers) or for military ships that can and will shoot and sink anything with the potential of becoming a threat.

	▲	cenamus 3 days ago \| parent [-]
		And floating power plants I suppose. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_floating_nuclear_power...

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HdS84 3 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The germans tried that in the 60s see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Hahn_(ship). It was uneconomical. You need specialized engineers for that, you need special permissions for ports and the important canals are off limits due to risk.

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ViewTrick1002 3 days ago | parent | prev [-]

But an extremely expensive crew to run it coupled with extremely high CAPEX.

Even navies are moving away from nuclear power due to how expensive it is.