Probably a stupid car question...

[Lissa]

Once again, you continue to neglect that you must have a certain amount of material between you and the radiation source, this is something you cannot work around.

Well, no. I'm not suggesting we go without shielding. I'm suggesting we find ways to divide atoms in a manner where the reaction is more predictable and controlled, and based on a "safer" reaction we then shield according to what is needed. If it requires 10 feet of lead to shield it, then the reaction is wrong for our purposes. There are some promising idea's... Hybrid fission/fusion seems like a nice compromise for large reactors, but like hybrid cars, you end up with two systems, more complexity, cost, and need more space. But, if you could control a release of neutrons into natural thorium 232, or uranium 238, then you might direct the direction and number of stray ionizing particles into dense capture materials (and actually "breed" more fuel).

What are your thoughts on traveling wave reactors? It's sort of like the Toshiba 4S, but doesn't need a neutron reflector.

Or how about something like the Hyperion Mini Nuclear Reactor?

Ok, last time I'm going to post on this cause you can't seem to understand that necessity of shielding. You have to have something there to shield a reactor like this, it doesn't matter how compact you make or how low power it's going to be, there has to be shielding. Shielding is bulky and it weighs a lot. While a reactor like the Hyperion could work for powering a neighborhood or the like, it's still bulky.

Also, you keep mentioning technologies, like the Wave reactor that have been around for decades, yet haven't been used. There's a reason why converters (the Wave reactor) and breeders are not used, and it's political, ie Non-Proliferation Treaty. Because of politics, the only reactors that you will see for civilian use are burner style reactors we have now.

Lastly, we can make reactors that will run for 30+ years without refueling, the problem, again has to deal with Non-Proliferation. Naval reactors are designed to run for 30 years without refueling as they use extremely enriched uranium for their fuel (95%+ enrichment, almost pure Uranium 235). The ship is decommisioned when the reactor's fuel finally starts being so poisoned by the fission fragments that it is difficult to produce power. The Enterprise's refueling was actually a rarity amount ships equipped with Naval reactors, the rest typically get turned into razor blades.