[atemerev]

RTGs can’t do that. Compact nuclear reactors, however, can.

The problem is that a nuclear reactor is a dynamic system, with some moving parts. It requires thermal management. It requires dynamic control. It is really hard to design a fully self-contained nuclear power system which wouldn’t require any human intervention to operate.

And even if we could, there is also a problem of waste management. Nuclear waste is not too dangerous, if you don’t touch it. It is, however, quite dangerous, if you grind it into fine particles and spray a large city with it by a crop duster. Our world is crazy. There are people like that out there, who might be interested in it. It is relatively hard to obtain hot nuclear waste from centralized large power plants. It will be really easy in the case of small building-scale reactors.