Show HN: Reactor Atlas

defrost · 2026-09-04T06:36:55.000000Z

Nice site, looks like you had a bit of fun putting it together.

Missing the Australian research reactor OPAL in Lucas Heights, Sydney - https://www.ansto.gov.au/education/nuclear-facts

Note that while you do have the no longer operating Fukushima Daiichi plant, you don't have the ceased functioning easter egg natural nuclear fission reactors, such as the one in Oklo, Gabon.

It seems related to address nuclear waste also - the filthy sites related to early nuclear weapons development, the surface blast sites during the testing years, current and proposed repository locations, various open pools of low level radioactive waste from mining, rare earth processing, etc.

And, if you're going "full stack" - nuclear sources - Olympic Dam (sitting tight with large reserves), former African sites, Kazakhstan supplying the US and elsewhere, automated uranium mining in Canada, etc.

fedecaccia · 2026-09-04T07:35:08.000000Z

The natural reactor in Oklo is a great one! It isn't a facility so it doesn't fit the current layers, but it deserves its own entry: added in the backlog and will be updated soon!

tomhow · 2026-09-04T08:03:59.000000Z

As defrost suggested, your comments have been autokilled as our software classifies them as likely LLM-generated or edited/polished. Please don't do this on HN. The community here much prefers imperfect-but-authentic writing, and we very much appreciate the effort!

fedecaccia · 2026-09-04T12:47:26.000000Z

Thanks! As I explained below, my first language is spanish and my intention was to provide fluid answers. Suggestion accepted.

defrost · 2026-09-04T07:44:28.000000Z

Heh, I hoped that might get a chuckle - sorry I missed the separate research layer <doh>

If you're an ESL (English as Second Language) speaker using AI assist for comments .. that might explain the number of [flagged][dead] comments you're getting (there's an AI detect layer at HN these days).

I've emailed HN@ycombinator and [vouched] the dead ones - fingers crossed.

fedecaccia · 2026-09-04T12:46:19.000000Z

THanks for your support defrost. Indeed, Im from Argentina and I tried to improve my answers assisted with AI. No more asistance, but I'm not that fluid in english!

defrost · 2026-09-04T12:55:36.000000Z

Your English is better than my Spanish :-)

If you keep noodling on this then I'd suggest getting the nuclear stack down pat, then gradually integrating full energy mixes per country, at first just showing the proportions of energy use provided by nuclear.

Make things clear as you go - a countries energy use is more than just electricity generation, for example, aim for bright 15 years old as a target audience perhaps.

A good many people do want to see better "dashboards" for their planet, over all and country by country.

fedecaccia · 2026-09-04T14:49:21.000000Z

thanks! and your comments are in the right direction, I plan to integrate other layers of the global energy network, with a better visualization of nuclear proportion by region/country.

amenghra · 2026-09-04T07:10:03.000000Z

There must be tons of research reactors around the world. E.g. https://www.epfl.ch/labs/lrs/facilities/crocus-reactor/ runs at 100W and is used for teaching/research purpose.

defrost · 2026-09-04T07:18:26.000000Z

Sure, and they should all be part of an Atlas that purports to map research reactors.

Moreover, the entire continent of Australia currently lacks any pins .. so it'd be nice to get one there for Lucas .. if not for for one of the globe's largest uranium reserves and maybe for that place where the British dusted a future UK Prime Minister with fallout.

fedecaccia · 2026-09-04T12:44:53.000000Z

I have changed the UI, now both power and research layers are on by default, so you should see nuclear pins in Australia at first sight. Thanks for the feedback!

fedecaccia · 2026-09-04T07:29:58.000000Z

Thanks, and good catches! But OPAL is indexed, along with CROCUS at EPFL: they live in the Research layer (the toggle next to the search box); the map opens on power reactors, where Australia has none, which is why the continent looked empty.

Direct links: OPAL https://reactoratlas.com/en?layer=research&s=au-opal and CROCUS https://reactoratlas.com/en?layer=research&s=ch-crocus. Fair point that the default view hides that, I'll make the layer switch more obvious.

mineralhoiland · 2026-09-04T07:41:00.000000Z

This is a cool development, it has great information on worldwide nuclear facilities and energy production details, I also enjoy vibe coding physics/scientific apps, and I've been working on nuclear fusion and alternative efficient reactor designs for the past few years. Nice to see another scientist adapting to AI acceleration of programming and research.

fedecaccia · 2026-09-04T12:43:33.000000Z

thanks for your support! Im passionate about nuclear fusion as well, and there will be more projects to come from my side..! Feel free to share your projects in the community! Happy to take a look

winrid · 2026-09-04T06:24:26.000000Z

I thought the monitoring part was cool: https://reactoratlas.com/en/monitoring

But why does it say stuff about hydropower? is that a translation bug?

> I strongly believe we humans shouldn't code anymore

It's okay to enjoy things.

fedecaccia · 2026-09-04T06:30:50.000000Z

Sure! not a translation bug! The monitoring section you mention is part of the “signals” layer, where I’m tracking things like increases/decreases in power generation and grid contributions. I think this kind of data could be useful for operators and institutions. The Monitoring/News section, on the other hand, is 99% nuclear.

And yeah, fair point on the coding comment. I guess I still enjoy it too much! I’ll publish some piece of code fully coded by my own fingers one of these days

sajithdilshan · 2026-09-04T09:04:54.000000Z

Cool site, didn't know Bangladesh was building nuclear reactors. Good for them. Stable and affordable energy is paramount to lift millions out of poverty. Hope Bangladesh would get more industrial factories that is being moved out of countries like Germany.

beyondcompute · 2026-09-04T06:18:16.000000Z

Cool project! However, the map-globe navigation feels confusing and unintuitive compared to a more conventional 2D map UI. Also the clustering algorithm makes labels “jump” in a jarring way during zooming. I’d tune it somehow so that it feels better to the users.

fedecaccia · 2026-09-04T06:33:29.000000Z

Thanks for the feedback! Al these are welcome and Im taking note for improvements. On the 2D map UI: you can select the 2D option right above the years slider. I hope it works as expected! Will update soon with the other improvements!

kaito2503 · 2026-09-04T11:49:44.000000Z

jtreitz · 2026-09-04T08:43:12.000000Z

hurts to see Germany at 0MWe in 2026 :(

fedecaccia · 2026-09-04T13:01:11.000000Z

a reaction to 2011 fukushima event. The ironic fact: if you check japan nuclear power evolution, they just had a small drop and later keep growing, nowadays in top 3!