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This here is very fair comment - and why I talk about things like public finance of construction, public ownership of utilities, standardisation on a single design, etc etc.
Is it flashy like the promises of Gen4 reactors? No. It's boring but practical and what needs to be done. https://twitter.com/KHayhoe/status/1115413523901878272
Is it flashy like the promises of Gen4 reactors? No. It's boring but practical and what needs to be done. https://twitter.com/KHayhoe/status/1115413523901878272
On a personal level the emerging designs I am most interested in are the @NuScale_Power 60MWe iPWR, and the @gehnuclear 300MWe BWRX-300.
Both of them are essentially iterations on existing designs with thousands of reactor-years of experience and a strong technical base.
Both of them are essentially iterations on existing designs with thousands of reactor-years of experience and a strong technical base.
Pushing Gen4 nuclear to the exclusion of all else is.... foolish.
That said I do absolutely want to see a science part dedicated specifically to their physical prototyping and development.
The promises and perils of many a design only show when it's actually built.
That said I do absolutely want to see a science part dedicated specifically to their physical prototyping and development.
The promises and perils of many a design only show when it's actually built.
Incidentally, a great deal of the problems in getting nuclear plants built on time I think is down to two factors:
- Many designs (EPR, AP1000, etc) are still first-of-a-kind, which means encountering all the annoyances and weird problems you didn't know you had yet. Expensive.
- Many designs (EPR, AP1000, etc) are still first-of-a-kind, which means encountering all the annoyances and weird problems you didn't know you had yet. Expensive.
- Licencing requirements incentivise single units that are *very* large. Note how the 900MWe CPY gave way to the 1300MWe P4 which gave way to the 1450MWe N4 - and then to the 1660/1750MWe EPR.
Increasing the size increases the complexity and the cost of fabrication.
Increasing the size increases the complexity and the cost of fabrication.
Even 900MWe is huge by power station standards - a typical coal unit usually tops out at 500MWe and combined-cycle gas units at 400MWe.
Building three 500MWe units is significantly less technically challenging than building a single 1500MWe unit, as a rule of thumb.
Building three 500MWe units is significantly less technically challenging than building a single 1500MWe unit, as a rule of thumb.
Reason it's ended up like that? Lack of class licencing. Each reactor has to be individually licenced and reviewed and this process is expensive. So, it works out more economic to build reactors very, very big.
Naturally, then the problems start.
Naturally, then the problems start.
Such large pressure vessels are specialist items and only a few facilities can make them. Spinning up such facilities and getting the tooling right takes time. If you change the design, you have to reconfigure everything all over again.
Meanwhile? If you do what @gehnuclear is doing with the BWRX-300? You can build most of the key components in a factory on a production line.
BWRX generates 1/5th the power of the ESBWR on which it is based - but is 1/10th the plant volume with correspondingly simpler systems.
BWRX generates 1/5th the power of the ESBWR on which it is based - but is 1/10th the plant volume with correspondingly simpler systems.
It also reduces the buy-in capital: many countries will be given pause by the multibillion dollar capital needed for a large nuclear plant.
SMRs like the BWRX-300 and the NuScale design only, by comparison, require hundreds of millions of dollars.
Still big, but not vast.
SMRs like the BWRX-300 and the NuScale design only, by comparison, require hundreds of millions of dollars.
Still big, but not vast.
And in all of this a matter is quite clear:
This is based on iterations of already proven and understood technology. Gen4 nuclear will arrive eventually but it is *not* turnkey, and selling great promises on it (and hurling venom at critics) is not the way to go.
This is based on iterations of already proven and understood technology. Gen4 nuclear will arrive eventually but it is *not* turnkey, and selling great promises on it (and hurling venom at critics) is not the way to go.
