I remember during my undergraduate physics years at the University of Otago, we had a visiting guest speaker - I think it was Dale Bridenbaugh around 1976 when he had resigned as a manager in GE's nuclear division worried that their plants were not safe [0]. He had just also toured Australia as a guest speaker toward the anti-uranium effort [1].<p>At the time, Robert Muldoon was Prime Minister of New Zealand and was pursuing "think big" projects for NZ including a planned nuclear power station. As one of the "GE Three" [2], Bridenbaugh blew the whistle that the quoted price tag of the
power plant did not include necessary safety precautions which he eloquently explained would cost at least an order of magnitude more (greater than the GDP of NZ). Of course the whole idea made no sense in a country blessed with hydro and geothermal resources. In the end the project was abandoned for total cost of ownership budget reasons rather than nuclear issues.<p>I wonder what has changed since then?<p>[0] <a href="https://www.times.org/nuclear-power-back/2018/3/8/the-long-tragic-trail-of-defective-general-electric-nuclear-reactors-from-hanford-to-fukushima" rel="nofollow">https://www.times.org/nuclear-power-back/2018/3/8/the-long-t...</a><p>[1] <a href="https://www.bmartin.cc/pubs/82alternatives.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.bmartin.cc/pubs/82alternatives.html</a><p>[2] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GE_Three" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GE_Three</a>
<i>"The SMR’s 12 modules, each producing 50 megawatts"</i><p>So each module is a little smaller than the reactor of the 1960's era submarine I served on and is based on the same pressurized water technology. I was a "nuke" so had to go in the reactor compartment several times. As far as I can remember, the reactor was about 10 feet in diameter. We went in the shipyard for refueling after the lifetime of the rods, which was 15 years. I could never understand why we didn't build these for civilian use (cost I figured) but now we will. Cool.<p><a href="https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/news/2022/22-029.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/news/2022/22-...</a>
While this is an overall good development, and I wish the company luck. Its really not the solution.<p>While scale is what killed nuclear, the people who initially decided on scale, did so for good reason. You lose a huge amount if you scale down, specially with PWRs.<p>These small PWRs try to get some of that efficiency back with factory production, but at best it just evens out. The advantage is the added flexibility. So I don't think that putting traditional PWR in a tube is really any kind of series solution to transform our energy system.<p>However there are good things coming out of this. For example, NuScale went threw a process managing multiple reactors from the same control room. That is the same thing that essentially all GenIV reactors want to do as well. Having managed to get that concept threw the regulator will make it massively easier for anybody that follows.<p>Its a damn shame that we don't have GenIV reactors since the 80s. We had the technology and every reason to use it. We could be living in a nuclear age right now, and I consider it the largest failure of humanity that we failed to do so. People in 100 years will look back and think we were insane that we did not use the technology we discovered.
For those who are interested in the size (will it fit in my garage/car port?)<p>The picture in the article is a <i>NuScale Power Small Modular Power</i> plant[0].<p>> Each NuScale reactor vessel is expected to be 9 feet (2.7 m) in diameter and 65 feet (20 m) tall, weighing 650 short tons (590 metric tons).<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NuScale_Power" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NuScale_Power</a>
Interesting, Rolls Royce is doing the same in the UK and have been working on this since last year [0].<p>After having dealt with SONGS not long after Fukushima and seeing first hand the long-term adverse effects of Chernobyl in Europe I became anti-nuclear, but in time I realize that in reality what I was actually anti 20th Century nuclear business model and the corrupt regulatory frame work as most were built haphazardly in locations with immense inherit pitfalls, coupled with poor long-term logistical and waste management planning and ignored continuous warnings to decommission--TEPCO stated that the Fukushima disaster was entirely avoidable.<p>And that is what I think still needs to addressed, because the regulatory capture of these agencies poses a much bigger issue than these small reactors do, which are seemingly promising solutions to contribute to the World's energy needs.<p>0: <a href="https://www.rolls-royce.com/innovation/small-modular-reactors.aspx#/" rel="nofollow">https://www.rolls-royce.com/innovation/small-modular-reactor...</a>
As a complete novice, this could be a game changer?<p>The ability to centralize the production I imagine radically reduces the cost, or at least has the potential to.<p>With all the energy challenges we face, could the US government subsidize a program like this and make it a silver bullet?
Some numbers.<p>NuScale says their nuclear power module (NPM) output capacity is 77 MW (gross) [1].<p>NuScale says their plant designs can combine up to 12 NPMs for 924 MW total output [2].<p>One megawatt can power 400-1000 homes [3].<p>[1] <a href="https://www.nuscalepower.com/technology/technology-overview" rel="nofollow">https://www.nuscalepower.com/technology/technology-overview</a><p>[2] <a href="https://www.nuscalepower.com/about-us/faq#T2" rel="nofollow">https://www.nuscalepower.com/about-us/faq#T2</a><p>[3] <a href="https://www.betterhomelab.com/how-many-homes-can-1-mw-power/" rel="nofollow">https://www.betterhomelab.com/how-many-homes-can-1-mw-power/</a>
And 40 years later, after dozens of billions or more spent, someone might just be allowed to finally build an amazingly clunky, drastically bloated up version of it that has been finally approved by a myriad storm of shifting regulations and unhappy contrary interests.
These could be used to create a real "smart grid" where very local variations are smoothed out among various reactors, with some battery storage for peaking. So long as people are willing to live near them.
Outstanding! Instead of 300MW coal or gas-fired plants in metro areas we could have clusters of these. The shorter transmission distance will mean less line-loss, the factory-built design means economies of scale, and the passive-cooling post-scram ability means that it would be impossible to have a Fukushima type of accident due to loss of primary loop cooling. If every city acquire enough of these to cover 80% of their base load then we could cut carbon emissions so fast we it would astonish us all.
Matt Ridley from The Rational Optimist opened my eyes to Nuclear and how the issues have been how we were almost too careful and too afraid to test and implement and so we are now decades behind nuclear reactor research and implementation.
This certifies NuScale's 50 MWe reactor. But the CFPP project has moved to the 77 MWe version, and as I understand it that has not been certified. UAMPS also has only 103 MWe of subscriptions out of 476 MWe (6 x 77 MWe).
My problem with nuclear is the lack of a solution for waste. Geologic sequestration sounds like it could work, but it has been politically dead in water in the US. There are few success stories in this category internationally and lots of little nuclear waste depots. Some pose catastrophic risks to the communities they are stored in. The clean up efforts at these sites are often endless feast for government contractors way behind, insanely over budget.<p>I want to see modular reactors succeed, but the prospect of more nuclear waste depots with no long term plan in the US comes of to me as brazenly irresponsible.
Fully half the development cost, and <i>all</i> of the construction and deployment cost of the first few placements, was picked up my US taxpayers. But Bill Gates and cronies retain 100% ownership.
To worry some people, the commission certifying this also downplayed the three miles incident.<p>"However, the NRC faced the same problems in obtaining accurate information as the state, and was further hampered by being organizationally ill-prepared to deal with emergencies, as it lacked a clear command structure and did not have the authority either to tell the utility what to do or to order an evacuation of the local area."<p>- <a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Mile_Island_accident" rel="nofollow">https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Mile_Island_accident</a>
What of the Integral Fast Reactor which has the waste disposal issue licked?<p>It seems no one wants to discuss the huge progress made in the design of nuclear reactors over the years.<p>The idea that a technology which has been in development for 70 years hasn't improved enough to be practical is simply bollocks.
So, how much time and how many people (# trained/specialist, # non-specialist) do I need to steal the core and fence it to unnamed Eurasian wanna-be nuclear power ?
> just the seventh that has been approved for use in the US<p>What a colossal failure. This seems more like evidence that the regulatory regime was designed to make nuclear power expensive and controlled by a small number of companies with deep pockets.
I think this is an area where industrial policy should play a serious role.<p>I am firmly against a technology with such a unequal downside/upside ratio. It's not that nuclear fission is <i>inherently</i> unsafe, it's just that every reactor needs to be playing it's A game every day.<p>We need to be lucky every day, mother nature only needs to be lucky once.<p>Maybe, maybe we can treat these as giant durcell batteries and use them for five years then seal it in concrete on site. But that does not seem to be the play here - so all the recycling and transport and handling just scales up - and it costs to be on your A game. The US military might afford this. but even they will probably want to run down the costs in the next few decades.