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This is a huge issue for nuclear power generally. It is incredibly expensive to navigate the regulations. Oklo thought they were good and now they need to spend

This is a huge issue for nuclear power generally. It is incredibly expensive to navigate the regulations. Oklo thought they were good and now they need to spend millions and millions more to apply again. (I’m assuming good faith on Oklo’s part). I really think there needs to be serious reform at the NRC.

voz_ 5y ago
You call it an issue, I call it a boon. I do not want nuclear power approved quickly, or easily. I want it to be burdensome, difficult, and with a massive requirement for proving out safety in even the most unlikely of scenarios. This area does not need Silicon Valley style disruption at the cost of endangering lives and destroying the earth.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- losvedir 5y ago
  This is very much "status quo" bias, as if the current state of the world were not endangering lives and destroying the earth. People talk about climate change in apocalyptic terms until it actually matters in real world decisions for things other than the things they wanted to do anyway.
- blhack 5y ago
  >This area does not need Silicon Valley style disruption at the cost of endangering lives and destroying the earth. We are currently destroying the earth because we are stuck using technology from the 1800s to power our 21st century society. Yes we do need silicon valley style disruption. Give them a pacific atoll, or an old oil drilling platform, and let them do whatever they want.
  - worik 5y ago
    We have the tools we need, already, to avert the catastrophe. Problem is it will cost the rich and powerful a little opportunity cost and a bit of wealth. The looming climate catastrophe has political and social solutions. Not technical ones.
    - p1mrx 5y ago
      Storing wind/solar energy for a long enough duration to prevent long-tail blackouts, while also transitioning buildings to electric heat, is a pretty big technical problem.
      - TillE 5y ago
        Pumped hydroelectric storage is a "big" problem in that the scale is large, but it's not particularly complicated. The solutions exist, and they're comfortably boring, and trivially scalable and redundant. Moreover, we're still pretty far from the point where this even becomes an issue. We can accelerate the deployment of renewables a lot before this is a real constraint on anything.
    - stjohnswarts 5y ago
      We don't though, or we'd be using them. Nuclear is clearly the only current technology that can provide the same type of grid available electricity that we're used to AND actually exists Now.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - worik 5y ago
        That is twentieth century thinking. Central power plants with a grid to distribute In the future (I predict) it will more and more be distributed both production and consumption. The technology all exists. But it does not suit the concentration of power. It will take democracy (people taking action - perhaps direct action) to avert the catastrophe. I am optimistic.
  - bagacrap 5y ago
    I do not thing regulatory hurdles are what's stopping us from building more nuclear plants but public funding and will. So if a bored billionaire wants to enter this space, he won't be stymied by the approval process or need to sidestep it.
    - fastball 5y ago
      This seems not grounded in reality.
halpert 5y ago
The article is really sparse on what information was missing. Neither the NRC or Oklo specified what else is needed. It’s probably wise to give both sides the benefit of the doubt.
- bgentry 5y ago
  While the article doesn't reference all these details, the NRC's denial letter to Oklo covers more of them: https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML2200/ML22006A267.pdf https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML2200/ML22006A267.pdf The claim from the NRC in that letter is: “Oklo’s application continues to contain significant information gaps in its description of Aurora’s potential accidents as well as its classification of safety systems and components,” Veil said. “These gaps prevent further review activities. We are prepared to re-engage with Oklo if they submit a revised application that provides the information we need for a thorough and timely review.” (phew, that PDF does not copy/paste text cleanly, at least not in Safari. Had to re-type it.)
  - halpert 5y ago
    That sounds reasonable to me.
    - jjoonathan 5y ago
      What are the gaps? Asking for more information until the other party gives up is a tactic -- as is refusing to provide damning information. It's hard to say which game is being played, or even if any game is being played at all, without knowing details.
      - wesoff 5y ago
        From Rod Adams: Oklo's COL application is part of an effort to achieve a difficult, but important goal. The company has challenged the standard way of doing things and designed a nuclear power system that is as different from a conventional reactor as a gasoline powered scooter is from a 100 MW slow speed diesel pushing a large container ship. Oklo submitted a license application they believe satisfies the letter and the intent of the governing regulations in a form appropriate for its proposed system. The NRC reviewers are not yet satisfied with the information provided and left open the opportunity to modify the application to fill in the gaps it believes exist. The NRC chose to deny the application instead of continuing the process of obtaining additional information. That might have been stimulated by a legislative timeline of 3 years from docketing to final determination. I expect Oklo will be resubmitting its application before the end of the summer. Longer explanation Oklo's application doesn't follow the Standard Review Plan format. That 4,500 page document of regulatory guidance fits the large light water reactor systems, structures, components, and processes it was designed for. But it is unwieldy and inappropriate for Oklo's reactor design. Reviewers are used to the SRP and the applications produced using its specified format; they are not yet comfortable with the way that the Oklo application provides required information. The NRC's denial of Oklo's novel COL application is a disappointment, but it's not a complete surprise. Oklo is doing something that is difficult by pushing change in a federal regulatory agency whose processes and procedures have been developed over decades to focus on a particular kind of reactor. Oklo's 1.5 MWe reactor uses liquid metal filled heat pipes to passively move heat energy out of a few dozen assemblies containing metallic alloy fuel rods. That is a completely different machine than a 1,000 MWe reactor that pumps high pressure water through a core made up of hundreds of assemblies consisting of a bundle of hundreds of thin walled tubes filled with UO2 pellets. Oklo and the NRC review team have worked diligently to come to an agreement that the COL contained information required for a complete safety review. Oklo has answered every request for information it has received, but the NRC has judged those responses to be not yet complete. The NRC had the option of obtaining information it thought was missing through another, more focused round of RAIs and response. Under the pressure of a Congressionally mandated deadline of 3 years for reviewing a docketed application, it chose to deny the application "without prejudice." This gives the NRC the opportunity, outside of a formal license review process, to communicate what they believe is missing from the application. It gives Oklo the opportunity to produce a better application that fills those information gaps.
Karunamon 5y ago
Pertinent info FTA: Oklo co-founder and COO Caroline Cochran pointed out the stunning fact that no nuclear plant that has submitted an application since the formation of the NRC in 1975 has yet commenced operation. Assuming accuracy, that's a damning statistic. I don't believe for a minute that every single application that's crossed their desk for nearly half a century was so flawed or unsafe that it was unworkable. Knowing what I know of governments and bureaucrats, I'd speculate that they're being asked for a bunch of irrelevant or impossible (i.e. doesn't apply to their design) information, and the people in the bureau are being useless and obstructive about it since there's no downsisde for false negatives.
- samwillis 5y ago
  There was an interesting discussion of this on Twitter the other day when Patrick Collison posted about it: https://mobile.twitter.com/patrickc/status/1480729010325766148 https://mobile.twitter.com/patrickc/status/14807290103257661...
- Gwypaas 5y ago
  Not really, it is very specifically worded to paint the NRC in bad light. Vogtle, Virgil C. Summer and company have gotten the applications regarding their designs approved. They just haven't managed to bring the construction to a finish yet. The NRC may be the culprit there also, but that is a completely different question.
  - gautamcgoel 5y ago
    Aren't those standard LWR designs? Have any new technologies been approved?
- burkaman 5y ago
  It's pretty carefully worded, even if that's true it's possible that NRC has approved lots of applications that haven't commenced operation for other reasons. It's bad regardless, but unclear if NRC is rejecting everything or if projects are failing because of other factors.

voz_ 5y ago

You call it an issue, I call it a boon. I do not want nuclear power approved quickly, or easily. I want it to be burdensome, difficult, and with a massive requirement for proving out safety in even the most unlikely of scenarios. This area does not need Silicon Valley style disruption at the cost of endangering lives and destroying the earth.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
losvedir 5y ago
This is very much "status quo" bias, as if the current state of the world were not endangering lives and destroying the earth. People talk about climate change in apocalyptic terms until it actually matters in real world decisions for things other than the things they wanted to do anyway.
blhack 5y ago
>This area does not need Silicon Valley style disruption at the cost of endangering lives and destroying the earth. We are currently destroying the earth because we are stuck using technology from the 1800s to power our 21st century society. Yes we do need silicon valley style disruption. Give them a pacific atoll, or an old oil drilling platform, and let them do whatever they want.
- worik 5y ago
  We have the tools we need, already, to avert the catastrophe. Problem is it will cost the rich and powerful a little opportunity cost and a bit of wealth. The looming climate catastrophe has political and social solutions. Not technical ones.
  - p1mrx 5y ago
    Storing wind/solar energy for a long enough duration to prevent long-tail blackouts, while also transitioning buildings to electric heat, is a pretty big technical problem.
    - TillE 5y ago
      Pumped hydroelectric storage is a "big" problem in that the scale is large, but it's not particularly complicated. The solutions exist, and they're comfortably boring, and trivially scalable and redundant. Moreover, we're still pretty far from the point where this even becomes an issue. We can accelerate the deployment of renewables a lot before this is a real constraint on anything.
  - stjohnswarts 5y ago
    We don't though, or we'd be using them. Nuclear is clearly the only current technology that can provide the same type of grid available electricity that we're used to AND actually exists Now.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - worik 5y ago
      That is twentieth century thinking. Central power plants with a grid to distribute In the future (I predict) it will more and more be distributed both production and consumption. The technology all exists. But it does not suit the concentration of power. It will take democracy (people taking action - perhaps direct action) to avert the catastrophe. I am optimistic.
- bagacrap 5y ago
  I do not thing regulatory hurdles are what's stopping us from building more nuclear plants but public funding and will. So if a bored billionaire wants to enter this space, he won't be stymied by the approval process or need to sidestep it.
  - fastball 5y ago
    This seems not grounded in reality.

halpert 5y ago

The article is really sparse on what information was missing. Neither the NRC or Oklo specified what else is needed. It’s probably wise to give both sides the benefit of the doubt.

bgentry 5y ago
While the article doesn't reference all these details, the NRC's denial letter to Oklo covers more of them: https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML2200/ML22006A267.pdf https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML2200/ML22006A267.pdf The claim from the NRC in that letter is: “Oklo’s application continues to contain significant information gaps in its description of Aurora’s potential accidents as well as its classification of safety systems and components,” Veil said. “These gaps prevent further review activities. We are prepared to re-engage with Oklo if they submit a revised application that provides the information we need for a thorough and timely review.” (phew, that PDF does not copy/paste text cleanly, at least not in Safari. Had to re-type it.)
- halpert 5y ago
  That sounds reasonable to me.
  - jjoonathan 5y ago
    What are the gaps? Asking for more information until the other party gives up is a tactic -- as is refusing to provide damning information. It's hard to say which game is being played, or even if any game is being played at all, without knowing details.
    - wesoff 5y ago
      From Rod Adams: Oklo's COL application is part of an effort to achieve a difficult, but important goal. The company has challenged the standard way of doing things and designed a nuclear power system that is as different from a conventional reactor as a gasoline powered scooter is from a 100 MW slow speed diesel pushing a large container ship. Oklo submitted a license application they believe satisfies the letter and the intent of the governing regulations in a form appropriate for its proposed system. The NRC reviewers are not yet satisfied with the information provided and left open the opportunity to modify the application to fill in the gaps it believes exist. The NRC chose to deny the application instead of continuing the process of obtaining additional information. That might have been stimulated by a legislative timeline of 3 years from docketing to final determination. I expect Oklo will be resubmitting its application before the end of the summer. Longer explanation Oklo's application doesn't follow the Standard Review Plan format. That 4,500 page document of regulatory guidance fits the large light water reactor systems, structures, components, and processes it was designed for. But it is unwieldy and inappropriate for Oklo's reactor design. Reviewers are used to the SRP and the applications produced using its specified format; they are not yet comfortable with the way that the Oklo application provides required information. The NRC's denial of Oklo's novel COL application is a disappointment, but it's not a complete surprise. Oklo is doing something that is difficult by pushing change in a federal regulatory agency whose processes and procedures have been developed over decades to focus on a particular kind of reactor. Oklo's 1.5 MWe reactor uses liquid metal filled heat pipes to passively move heat energy out of a few dozen assemblies containing metallic alloy fuel rods. That is a completely different machine than a 1,000 MWe reactor that pumps high pressure water through a core made up of hundreds of assemblies consisting of a bundle of hundreds of thin walled tubes filled with UO2 pellets. Oklo and the NRC review team have worked diligently to come to an agreement that the COL contained information required for a complete safety review. Oklo has answered every request for information it has received, but the NRC has judged those responses to be not yet complete. The NRC had the option of obtaining information it thought was missing through another, more focused round of RAIs and response. Under the pressure of a Congressionally mandated deadline of 3 years for reviewing a docketed application, it chose to deny the application "without prejudice." This gives the NRC the opportunity, outside of a formal license review process, to communicate what they believe is missing from the application. It gives Oklo the opportunity to produce a better application that fills those information gaps.

Karunamon 5y ago

Pertinent info FTA: Oklo co-founder and COO Caroline Cochran pointed out the stunning fact that no nuclear plant that has submitted an application since the formation of the NRC in 1975 has yet commenced operation. Assuming accuracy, that's a damning statistic. I don't believe for a minute that every single application that's crossed their desk for nearly half a century was so flawed or unsafe that it was unworkable. Knowing what I know of governments and bureaucrats, I'd speculate that they're being asked for a bunch of irrelevant or impossible (i.e. doesn't apply to their design) information, and the people in the bureau are being useless and obstructive about it since there's no downsisde for false negatives.

samwillis 5y ago
There was an interesting discussion of this on Twitter the other day when Patrick Collison posted about it: https://mobile.twitter.com/patrickc/status/1480729010325766148 https://mobile.twitter.com/patrickc/status/14807290103257661...
Gwypaas 5y ago
Not really, it is very specifically worded to paint the NRC in bad light. Vogtle, Virgil C. Summer and company have gotten the applications regarding their designs approved. They just haven't managed to bring the construction to a finish yet. The NRC may be the culprit there also, but that is a completely different question.
- gautamcgoel 5y ago
  Aren't those standard LWR designs? Have any new technologies been approved?
burkaman 5y ago
It's pretty carefully worded, even if that's true it's possible that NRC has approved lots of applications that haven't commenced operation for other reasons. It's bad regardless, but unclear if NRC is rejecting everything or if projects are failing because of other factors.