Ask a Question
or
Create a Poll
  1. Home /
  2. Questions /
  3. Transportation
  4. / Ships And Boats
  5. / Submarines
  6. / More Submarines

by kenjg1942 on January 20th, 2007

kenjg1942

Question

Help answer this question below.

How come we have nuclear powered submarines and not large ships or cruiseliners?

  • Like
  • Report
Share:
Other

Answers. 6 helpful answers below.

  • by 8 Jan 2004-10 Dec 2009 on January 21st, 2007

    8 Jan 2004-10 Dec 2009

    There are other reasons that are not touched on here.

    Part of the expense is due to personnel. The Navy pays their reactor operators the same as any other person of equivalent paygrade so they can ignore that cost. A civilian RTO would want so much money that the cruiseline would balk at hiring them.

    The fuel used in military reactors is "a little" purer than the stuff you see in a shore-based reactor, and that purification costs money. The purer you get, the more it costs. By the time you get to milspec purity, the cost would be so prohibitive that no civilian company would want to foot the bill.

    There is limited space onboard a nuclear vessel. Cruise ships NEED space for their ballrooms and pools and passenger accommodations. You can't stack paying passengers 3-4 high in a room with hundreds of other passengers like you can with an aircraft carrier, or hot-rack 'em like you do on a sub.

    • Like
    • Report

    6 comments | Post one | Permalink

  • by The Chief on October 15th, 2009

    The Chief

    The United States also has nuclear powered air craft carriers, and for a while, we had nuclear powered missile cruisers which were designed to be high speed escorts for the carriers.

    The nuclear cruisers were eventually decommissioned and no more were built.

    The U.S. built one nuclear powered merchant vessel in 1959, the N/S Savannah, but her high operating costs at the time resulted in her being decommissioned in 1975. She was built to be a cargo/passenger ship and was operated as such from 1965 to 1971, and was decommissioned in 1972.

    The N/S Savannah was really a concept ship, born out of the "Atoms for Peace" initiative. The reactor first achieved critical operations in 1962. After a period of testing and research, the ship was finally put into service in 1965.

    The ship operated wonderfully, by all accounts from those who operated her. But because she was designed as much to be a showboat as anything else, she was not optimally designed for economical cargo transport. She was built to demonstrate the technical feasability of nuclear power on a merchant ship, not as a profit venture. A lot of sacrifices were made in size and space because of this, so she did not turn enough of a profit to become a successful, profitable merchant vessel. Had she been designed from the start to be a large cargo vessel, she would have likely been in operation for many more years.

    Ironically 2 years after her decommissioning, the high costs of fossil fuel would have made her break even on operating costs, even with her cargo limitations. In her short term of service, she saved over 29 MILLION gallons of fuel oil.

    Only three other nuclear powered merchant ships were ever built:

    Germany: N/S Otto Hahn
    Japan: N/S Mutsu (Never carried any cargo)
    Russia: N/S Sevmorput (Cargo/ice breaker, still in service)

    http://www.nssavannah.net/?ID=31
    http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/ship/savannah11.htm
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NS_Savannah
    http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&rlz=1T4RNWN_enUS256US257&resnum=0&q=n/s+savannah&um=1&ie=UTF-8&ei=CjjXSozMF4bCNvz3kcsI&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&ct=title&resnum=4&ved=0CB0QsAQwAw
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_civilian_nuclear_ships

    • Like
    • Report

    No comments. Post one | Permalink

  • by mac1896 on January 20th, 2007

    mac1896

    Cruise lines are notorious for hiring the cheapest labor possible. Nuclear techs do not fall under that category.

    Another reason is the security involved with a reactor nowadays, would be almost impossible on a cruise ship or commercial vessel.

    There were nuke freighters back in the 60s-70s. The "Savannah", "Otto Hahn",and the "Mutsu".

    The Russians have a nuke icebreaker, the name escapes me right now.

    • Like
    • Report

    1 comment | Post one | Permalink

  • by biketroy on January 20th, 2007

    biketroy

    Some navy ship are nuclear powered.
    It's cost prohibitive for cruise ships, who wants to go that fast on the water anyway.

    • Like
    • Report

    3 comments | Post one | Permalink

  • by guitarman18 on January 25th, 2007

    guitarman18

    Not just submarines, we have nuclear powered aircraft carriers and cruisers.

    2 comments | Post one | Permalink

  • by Anonymous on January 21st, 2007

    Anonymous

    We may have these already, the public just may not be aware of it.

    No comments. Post one | Permalink

Want to attach an image to your answer? Click here.

Did this answer your question? If not, then ask a new question or create a poll.

More Questions. Additional questions in this category.

You're reading How come we have nuclear powered submarines and not large ships or cruiseliners?

Follow us on Facebook!

Related Ads

Related Questions

Professionally Researched

ANSWERBAG BUZZ

Nuclear powered usb
Nuclear ship mutsu
Nuclear powered cruise ship
Nuclear powered submarines carriers
If cruise ships are powered by nuclear how much fuel can be saved

Answerbag

a Demand Media company