Guide: Nuclear Age
Before trying to handle radioactive materials, please read up on Material Safety for your own safety and information.
Uranium Enrichment
Related Page: Uranium Hexafluoride
Enriching uranium involves several steps in order to convert raw uranium ore into usable isotopes like uranium-235 and uranium-238. In order to enrich uranium from the ore you must first obtain yellowcake, which is pure uranium oxide; yellowcake can be made in a chemical plant with uranium billets, sulfur, and hydrogen peroxide as shown in the recipe below. This step is locked behind petrochemicals as the final difficult component that you need to do uranium enrichment is the Overdrive Machine Upgrade.
500mB
The next step to enriching uranium is making uranium hexafluoride, which will be essential for extracting pure uranium isotopes. To make it you must combine your yellowcake with water and fluorite in a chemical plant, this will also give you your sulfur back which you can reuse to produce more uranium hexafluoride.
1,000mB
1,200mBNow we must use a gas centrifuge, or rather, 4 of them. To start we must place 4 gas centrifuges in a row (consult the image above), you should notice that there is a kind of output on one of the sides, this is where the centrifuges connect with each other; you should also remember to craft a gas centrifuge overclocking upgrade and place it on the last centrifuge, otherwise it won't work; we should then connect our chemical plant with the first centrifuge in line and from there the 4 centrifuges will process the hexafluoride.
The first 3 centrifuges will produce uranium-238 nuggets and fluorite, while the last one will also produce uranium-235 nuggets; with the 1200 mb of uranium hexafluoride that you made from the chemical plant, you will produce 11 uranium-238 nuggets, 1 uranium-235 nugget, and 4 fluorite.
With Uranium Enrichment done, we can now properly use that uranium to make fuel for the ZIRNOX reactor.
Nuclear Basics
Nuclear reactors are machines designed for large-scale energy production that are based on nuclear reactions, generally fission. Unlike regular power-generating machines, reactors do not necessarily produce electricity directly, though some can. Nuclear reactors are used for making energy, depleting fuel or doing other kinds of work. These usually use a cooling loop where electricity is generated by steam, though some don't.
ZIRNOX Nuclear Reactor
Main Page: ZIRNOX
The ZIRNOX nuclear reactor is probably the first nuclear reactor that most players will be able to access and it serves as a gentle introduction to the basic mechanics surrounding operating a nuclear reactor. It is the first early-game nuclear reactor. It is going to be used to produce power for early game because soon power shortages will become a thing. Similar to oil, its operation is described in more detail in its own respective page but there are some components to its operation that may catch players off guard for the first time:-
- The ZIRNOX outputs super dense steam, not normal steam. As such, the first fluid pipe that connects to the reactor should be set to super dense steam and the turbine it leads to should be set to super dense steam as well. The next pipe and turbine should then be set to dense steam as running a dense type of steam through a turbine will lower it down a level of compression (Ultra Dense Steam -> Super Dense Steam -> Dense Steam -> Steam -> Low Pressure Steam). The Reactor turns into a radiation bomb if super dense steam gets stuck in it, so be careful and don't mess up!
- If the reactor's temperature gauge is not at minimum 100C, then no steam will be produced. The reactor's temperature can be increased by venting CO2 and therefore allowing the reactor's core to run hotter, but the reactor will not function below 4000mb of CO2.
- Even though more powerful fuel rods meaning more heat meaning more power, the ZIRNOX setup might not be enough for powerful fuel rods. So be balanced and don't use high power fuel rods or else boom!
It is recommended not to rely on the ZIRNOX reactor for power over long periods of time due to it having greatly lower than average fuel efficiency compared to other kinds of reactors, so it is recommended to use it to provide power only as long as it takes to set up a slightly stronger reactor.
Pressurized Water Reactor
Main page: PWR
The PWR (Pressurized Water Reactor) is a modular fission reactor and the second beginnner-friendly nuclear reactor. This reactor's construction is similar to the RBMK, except that it's in 3D. It is a beginner friendly reactor as it is much safer, easier to operate, stable in its operation and melts down gently. In terms of capability, it's below the RBMK but above the ZIRNOX.
Fluids that can be used in the PWR have the tag [PWR Coolant] and each component block is prefixed with "PWR".
Cooling is performed passively by the reactor by pushing and pulling to and from internal buffers for hot and cold cooling fluid. Fluid can only be added to and removed from the PWR by fluid ducts attached to access ports. During operation, the amount of cooling fluid that is present in the fluid buffer will not affect how efficiently the reactor cools itself with the only requirement being that enough cooling fluid is left inside the reactor such that it can fully cool itself every tick.
Fuel is inserted into the reactor through the GUI or through access ports and decays at a rate specified by the amount of flux that the reactor is currently producing. Any fuels added to the fuel input slot will be automatically added to the reactor if any space is available, meaning that adding a stack of fuel at a time may lead to a rapid uncontrolled rise in reactivity.
Fission Products
Fission waste products can be extracted from the depleted fuel from these reactors through isotope separation by a SILEX or by centrifuging it with a centrifuge. These alloys are extremely useful as they are in a LOT of crafting recipes and are used to form alloys which are also super useful and necessary for progression. Some of the waste products can be extremely radioactive, so it is recommended to use radiation resistant armor when dealing with them.
Resistant Alloys
Main pages: Technetium, Technetium Steel / Cadmium, Cadmium Steel
Once the ZIRNOX Nuclear Reactor or a PWR is complete, you can get highly resistant alloys through depleted fuels from those reactors which will be used for various work and crafting, most notably technetium/cadmium steel plates.
Technetium Production
To produce technetium steel, you need to combine steel with a single nugget of technetium-99 in a blast furnace of any kind or through the crucible. This will yield one bar of Technetium Steel. Technetium-99 is a common waste product from the fission of uranium and plutonium. It has a relatively high half-life for a fission product, so its radioactivity is only mild. Technetium-99 can be extracted from spent uranium, plutonium, or MOX fuel via a ZIRNOX or research reactor. You just have to put the spent ZIRNOX Fuel Rod in a crafting table to get the Depleted Uranium-233 Fuel which then has to be put in a Spent Fuel Drum to cool it. The spent fuel drum needs to be underwater for it to work.
Cadmium
Cadmium steel is made by combining a nugget of cadmium with steel in a blast furnace or through a crucible, this yields an ingot of cadmium steel. Cadmium can be obtained by smelting cadmium powder, which can be obtained acidizing 10 mustard willow leaves with 250mb of high-perfomance solvent in the ore acidizer. Mustard willow can be found near bedrock oil deposits and need to be placed on a oily or dead dirt block to grow, they take time to grow and can be automated by using automatic buzzsaws
Cyclotron
Main page: Cyclotron
The Cyclotron is a multiblock machine that bombards element powders with element boxes to get heavier elements. Think of it as an advanced breeding reactor but for elements that consumes crazy amounts of energy.
This machine is very expensive to use and should only be used for very rare elements like nitanium, desh or antimatter. Many of the elements produced have very few uses, usually for nitanium production or being an intermediary step for another rare element, such as one of the rare earth elements or trans-schrabidic super heavy elements, notably australium.
The cyclotron can store up to 100 MHE and 32,000mb of water. Power is consumed very quickly at 690 million HE consumed per operation; Use all three slots at once to be most efficient. A schrabidium energy storage block at the minimum should suffice for a few operations. Water is converted into low-pressure steam fairly rapidly, requiring half an auxiliary cooling tower for continuous operation.
Magnetic Storage
Main pages: Heavy Magnetic Storage Tank, Magnetic Antimatter Container / Antimatter
Antimatter is a highly dangerous substance that instantly blows up in contact of matter. For example, when you drop a antimatter cell, it blows up causing a gamma-ray flash. Because of this, it needs to be stored in magnetic containment as any other normal tank or barrel would explode and needs to be handled carefully.
Ferrouranium
Main page: Ferrouranium
Ferrouranium is a carbon steel-uranium (238) alloy (hence the name) known for its high hardness and durability. It is also radiation resistant due to its uranium content. It is required to make the HEV MarK IV Power Armor, the ferrouranium anvil, research reactor, breeding reactor and the cooling tower.
It is produced in a crucible with one nugget of uranium-238 and 2 nuggets of steel giving you 3 nuggets of ferrouranium.
Research & Breeding Reactor
Main Pages: Research Reactor, Breeding Reactor
The research reactor is a non-power reactor intended for burning fuel efficiently and acting as a neutron source for breeding reactors. It has to be submerged in water to cool since it does not have the active cooling of a typical power reactor. A Ra226Be neutron source or Pu238Be neutron source plate is needed to begin the reaction, and then can be removed. It explodes at exactly 1,000°C, so be careful when using strong fuels and several breeders simultaneously. You can observe the temperature as well as outgoing flux with the seven-segment displays in the GUI. It emits Cherenkov radiation when operating as well as gas bubbles of oxyhydrogen formed from the decomposition of water due to the neutron flux.
The research reactor and breeding reactor are both assembled using the following recipes:
| Research Reactor | Breeding Reactor |
|---|---|
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 |
Where the breeding reactor core is assembled as such:
Chicago Pile
Main Page: Chicago Pile
The Chicago Pile is an early-game breeding reactor whose main purpose is that of transmuting uranium into plutonium.
In order to make a Chicago pile, you will need drilled blocks of graphite, which can be made by placing a block of graphite and then right clicking it with a hand drill; once all the blocks are drilled, you can then place your fuel rods into the the graphite blocks. When a fuel rod is placed into a block, you can use a screwdriver to take it out or a hand drill to determine statistics such as heat, flux and depletion.
The first fuel rods you are likely to use are the Ra226Be neutron source and the uranium rods, to make them you must craft them with the following recipes:
| Ra226Be | Uranium |
|---|---|
    |
  |
Ra226Be is a neutron source and thus outputs a constant flux of neutrons in every direction as rays, once a ray hits an uranium fuel rod, it will output rays of its own in every direction (the efficiency of which is maximum at 1.5 blocks away from the source). The uranium fuel rods also have a heat value that should be no higher than 1000, as upon hitting 1000, the rod block will "meltdown" releasing radiation and creating a fire which burns the other graphite blocks around it; a common cause of such meltdowns is by naïvely putting another layer directly on top of the bottom layer, at that point the neutrons have nowhere to escape and will begin heating up the uranium rods.
From there you can either wait until the depletion value of an uranium fuel rod reaches 50000 (or 75000 in 528 mode), at which point it will transmute into a plutonium fuel rod; or you can wait until it's just below that value, at which point it turns into a bred uranium fuel rod. You should then process them in a tier 2 anvil or higher to obtain billets of plutonium; it should also be pointed out that plutonium rods can also be used as stronger neutron sources for your Chicago pile.
| Bred Uranium Rod | Plutonium Rod |
|---|---|
     |
|
Another use of the Chicago pile involves transmuting lithium cells into tritium cells, to do so you must get a lithium cell to 30000 depletion and then you must take it out of the block.
RBMK
Main Page: RBMK
There is an in-game book titled "How 2 RBMK" that provides a detailed explanation of RBMK reactors. Be sure to check it out for in-depth information.
The RBMK is one of the largest and most complex reactors in this mod, requiring careful operation. A more detailed guide is available on its dedicated page. For now, only a small-scale RBMK is needed, as it will primarily be used for power generation and material irradiation.
The RBMK Irradiation Channel handles material irradiation. While it is not required for the reactor to function, it acts as an optional upgrade. This component stores materials and exposes them to high radiation levels, transforming them into new forms. It has many applications, but it is particularly useful for producing thorium fuel. When consistently supplied with thorium billets, a thorium-fueled RBMK can become self-sustaining.
Small & Simple RBMK Reactor
Currently we don't need a humongous and complex reactor for our needs, so we are just gonna build a small reactor which will get the job done. Please do not rely on this for too long as it's very small and weak.
Materials
- 4 RBMK Steam Channels
- 4 RBMK Structural Columns
- 1 RBMK Fuel Rod
- 4 RBMK Steam Connectors
- 3 Industrial Steam Turbines
- 1 Cooling Tower
- 1 Steel Barrel
- 1 Ra226Be RBMK Neutron Source
- 1 MEU RBMK Fuel Rod
- 9 RBMK Cover panels (Any variant)
Procedure
- Find a spacious spot where you will build your RBMK reactor. Once you've found that, place down the fuel rod in the middle, all 4 steam channels on the corners and the RBMK structural columns on the sides. Make sure to right click the steam channels and set each of them to super dense steam or else your reactor will explode.
- Underneath the reactor, Dig a 3x3 hole and connect the steam channels using fluid ducts set to water and then place the steam connectors under the steam channels and then connect them using fluid ducts which are set to super dense steam. (Refer to the image).
- Connect the fluid ducts that are set to water to a steel barrel and connect your cooling tower to the same barrel. Place down your steam turbines, connect the super dense steam to the turbines, connect the turbine which is outputting low-pressure steam to the cooling tower and basically form a cooling loop like you did with the ZIRNOX and PWR.
- Once all that is done, place down your cover panels on top of the RBMK channels to prevent radiation from leaking. Then put your Ra226Be neutron source in the fuel rod then replace it with the MEU fuel rod after a few seconds.
RBMK Irradiation Products
The RBMK irradiation channel allows us to transmute materials into different items using the flux from our RBMK reactor. Below is a few materials that will be extremely important at this stage of the game.
Bismuth/Arsenic
Bismuth is an extremely rare heavy element used to created versatile chipsets and other late-tier items. As the (former) tooltip states, it is a post-RBMK gate. It can be used to make various items like SiOX cancer medication to eliminate lung diseases, the magnetic extractor to "milk" duds, a tier 5 anvil, the bismuth pickaxe and bismuth armor.
It can be produced in various ways:-
- Bismuth is found in the decay chains of most nuclear waste, short-lived and long-lived nuclear waste, most of which consist of 15% bismuth with a few exceptions: neptunium fuel produces absolutely no bismuth and decayed highly enriched plutonium-241 fuel waste consists of 55% bismuth.
- Bismuth can be bred more directly using bismuth zirconium fast breeders which yields 43.3% Bismuth fully depleted, with an initial investment of 1 bismuth nugget per billet, making a total of 8 nuggets in investment per rod to potentially get ~20-21 nuggets (assuming average normal distribution).
- Bismuth can be obtained from decaying lead-209, produced by spent low enriched australium fuel.
- Bismuth can also be made by processing heavy metal bedrock ore with high-performance solvent.
High-Performance Solvent
Main page: High-Performance Solvent
High-performance solvent, also known as HPS, is a very important late mid-game fluid in the mod, allowing for the full processing of bedrock ore, and in the production of fullerene solution, a fluid used to make crystalline fullerite, a material used in many end-game recipes. It is a light blue, corrosive, flammable, radioactive fluid, providing 150.0kTU per bucket.
High-performance solvent can be produced in two different ways: In the industrial mixer and in an RBMK Irradiation Channel:
250mB
750mB
1,000mB
100mB
Tritium
Main page: Tritium
Tritium (Hydrogen-3) is a weakly radioactive isotope of hydrogen which can only be acquired by irradiating lithium or breeding it. It is used in a fusion reactor along with deuterium
Progression Gate: RBMK
An RBMK must be constructed in order to progress further within the mod, as it is the only way to produce your first bismuth. This makes the RBMK a "hard gate" to progression. Once you have successfully produced bismuth from your RBMK, either via an irradiation channel or by processing spent fuel, you may continue progressing through this guide.
Advanced Petrochemicals
Main page: Advanced Petroleum Processing
Once we have progressed beyond RBMK, a whole suite of new petrochemical products become available to us. Revisit Guide: Petroleum Processing to learn more about constructing an advanced oil refinery so you can get the required materials discussed below.
Reformate/Reformate Gas
Main pages: Reformate, Reformate Gas
Reformate is a product of Crude Oil obtained via a Vacuum Refinery. This fluid is part of progression as it is used produce Jet Fuel, BTX and more. It is a flammable and combustible fluid that provides 2.4 and 6.0 MHE per bucket.
It can be produced by pressurizing crude oil to 2PU and processing it in a vacuum refinery.
Reformate Gas is a gaseous version of Reformate. Though it has many different uses, it also is the 3rd fluid in terms of how much HE and TU per bucket it can generate.
It can be produced in a vacuum refinery by processing desulfurized crude oil which is pressurized to 2PU.
BTX
Main page: BTX
BTX is also a product of Crude Oil obtained via a Vaccum Refinery. This fluid is important of progression which is because it's the only fluid that can produce Hard Plastic in addition with Phosgene. It is a flammable, combustible and a high fuel grade fluid which can generate electricity providing 3.15MTU and 7.87MHE per bucket. It is also used in endgame to make the Inertial Confinement Fusion Reactor (ICF) and FEnSU, though that isn't important currently....
BTX can be produced in only 2 ways. And those are through Fractioning Tower(s). BTX can be acquired doing the following processes:
100mB
40mB
60mB
100mB60mB
40mBHard Plastic/PVC
Main page: Hard Plastic
Hard Plastic is a post-bismuth crafting material used in various late game recipes including missiles, the catalytic reformer, and various circuits. It can be produced in a chemical plant with the following recipe:
500mB
500mB
PVC is an alternative to hard plastic that is crafted with cadmium. It is useful in that it no longer requires BTX to craft and uses less chlorine and unsaturated hydrocarbons, but the presence of cadmium introduces different challenges to production.
It can be produced in a chemplant with the following recipe:
250mB250mB
Jet Fuel
Main page: Jet Fuel
Jet fuel is a fluid used by a few missiles, and can be burned in a turbofan for large-scale energy production. This fluid is an aviation grade fuel which is a flammable, combustible and polluting fluid, providing either 6.4 MTU or 9.6 MHE per bucket depending on use case.
It can be acquired by 2 ways, fractioning and mixing:
100mB60mB
40mB1,000mB
900mB1,000mB
Saturnite
Main page: Saturnite
Saturnite is a very durable, heat-resistant and corrosion-resistant alloy that is commonly used in containers, weapons, and knives. We need it as the Watz Power Plant requires it which is necessary for progression. Its plate form is what's most used in items, blocks, and machines, such as the antimatter containment barrel. It can be combined with meteorite powder to make starmetal.
It can be produced in a rotary furnace with the following recipe.
250mB
Watz
Main page: Watz Power Plant
The Watz Power Plant is a fission based nuclear reactor that sits beyond the RBMK and PWR in progression but before fusion. It is quite similar to the ZIRNOX reactor in the sense that it is (mostly) a single assembled unit into which fuel is placed and then reacts as opposed to a modular design style of other reactors. As such, it is quite simple to operate and is easy to run but unlike the ZIRNOX, it is incredibly expensive to construct and also produces difficult to deal with waste products. As well as this, it produces very little power for its position in the game's progression and aggressively melts down if not dealt with properly, making it a poor choice for for power generation in most cases. The primary reason it is constructed is for the waste byproduct it produces, poisonous mud, which is necessary for the production of CMB steel, a progression essential component. There is more information about this and how to use in it it's own page.
After construction, the Watz requires a pressure pump to be placed on top of itself, sufficient coolant in its internal buffers, and fuel pellets placed inside of its GUI to begin reacting. Due to it not boiling water directly, it requires a separate heat exchanging setup in order to boil water for power production. Compared to other reactors, it depletes fuel pellets incredibly slowly, making it a practical choice for a reactor on servers and nearly useless for the purpose of fuel breeding. Another useful feature of the Watz is that individual reactors can be stacked on top of each other and simultaneously activated and deactivated with a single pressure pump, meaning that large high output stacks of reactors can be easily controlled with a single signal.
Currently, the Watz reactor has a very limited selection of fuels with the majority of fuels being derived from schrabidium. The only non-schrabidium fuels are MEU, MEP, and HEN. There are also absorber pellets which are designed to absorb radiation and deplete into useful isotopes and materials but due to the previously described slow rate of depletion, this is rarely ever practical compared to other types of reactors.
Poisonous Mud
Main page: Poisonous Mud
Poisonous mud is a special type of waste/byproduct produced by the Watz Powerplant Operation and is used for obtaining CMB Steel, a necessary metal in the progression. It is highly corrosive to granular blocks like dirt and gravel and can slowly corrode stone into cobblestone.
It can be centrifuged to produce lots of dust, lead, iron, and some tiny piles of nuclear waste. In case of truly ludicrous amounts, it can be put into the specific Mud Containers (hold up to 64,000mb) to be easily incinerated.
CMB Steel
Main page: CMB Steel
CMB Steel is a progression necessary material that is used in various ways, making tools and armor and tiles
It is produced by crucible alloying of magnetized tungsten and molten poisonous mud bricks in a ratio of 6:3. It exists in block form, so block casts can be used to extract it from the crucible.
It is mainly used in many crafting recipes but you can also use it for other things like making tiles or crafting tools and armor from it.
Fusion time!
Main page: Fusion Reactor
The fusion reactor is a large, expensive, and advanced reactor type that runs by fusing various plasma types to generate heat to then produce steam, which in turn generates large amounts of electricity. More details about this reactor is of course in it's own page, still here is a bit of useful information. The different plasma types also generate different useful byproducts and differing levels of neutron flux for breeding bulk quantities of materials, such as lithium into tritium. It works in conjunction with the plasma heater, which provides the plasma. It requires a "blanket" lining to protect it from the heat and neutron flux, otherwise it will break the reactor. The fusion reactor has a static design, which is provided by a hologram projected by its core block. To fully construct, you will need:
- 292 Superconducting Magnets
- 292 Cast Steel Plate
- 64 Central Magnet Pieces
- 4 Magnet Motor Pieces
- 8 Reinforced Glass
- 1 Fusion Reactor Core Component (The control computer)
- 1 Blowtorch or Acetylene Welding Torch
There are no hatches/ports for access, it will automatically convert itself to a multiblock that lets you access the GUI from any part.
This reactor is going to be used mainly for acquiring chlorophyte. It can be obtained as a byproduct of helium-4 - oxygen plasma fusion. Mind that the production rate is only about 1 powder per minute of operation within the fusion reactor.
Ionized Particles
Main page: Ionized Particles
This substance is in the form of particle and is used to craft the most endgame materials and some more things. It can be produced by all plasmas in the fusion reactor except for helium-4-oxygen and balefire-antimatter. Helium-3-deuterium plasma is recommended due to 50% faster production.