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I believe they're right. The cost advantage of having standardized, factory built reactors is enormous. Instead of having one big reactor providing 1,5GW you ca

I believe they're right. The cost advantage of having standardized, factory built reactors is enormous. Instead of having one big reactor providing 1,5GW you can have five 300MW reactors strapped in parallel and have the same output. The reason nuclear reactors are so expensive is that each one is more or less a bespoke build, with regulators changing the rules constantly, sometimes during construction. There's no reason for nuclear reactors to be more expensive than a similar non-nuclear plant.

EricE 5y ago
>There's no reason for nuclear reactors to be more expensive than a similar non-nuclear plant. No reason other than politics and stupidity (over regulation, emotional fear mongering, ignorant baseless assumptions, etc.)
panick21_ 5y ago
While partly true, there is also a huge benefit of scale. And you need to actually hit way higher production numbers to truely hit economics of scale. Making 5 1.4GWe plants or making 24 300MWe doesnt garantee that it is much cheaper. Spezially if the 300MWe is a reactor of the same type. 300MWe PWRs will not be a huge benefit. Comparing a 500MWe (or even 1GWe) Molten Salt fueled reactor (or even Molten Salt cooled) will compare much better then any PWR, modular or not.
- UltraViolence 5y ago
  The article already points out that a 17 hour job at a site can be done in one hour at a factory. That's a huge savings factor right there! You don't need economies of scale to make SMR's profitable. They already are from the get go.
  - panick21_ 5y ago
    I have seen a some of analysis that suggested that as long as you are working with PWR you are not gone do a huge amount better economically. It might be a little better, but we have to break free of water cooled reactor. It makes simply no sense as a design point. The only reason we have it is because it made sense for nuclear submarines.
    - UltraViolence 5y ago
      The cost gains are from standardized build templates with factory built components. Like I said, today's nuclear reactors are all bespoke builds.
      - panick21_ 5y ago
        Yes but as I pointed out, if you study mass production, the benefits of standardization and mass production are proportional to amount you produce. Going from producing 1 of something to 4 of something, the benefits are not actually that large. There is a far, far bigger effect going from PWR to a Molten Salt because that results in a factor 10 or more in difference in size of plant for the same output.

EricE 5y ago

>There's no reason for nuclear reactors to be more expensive than a similar non-nuclear plant. No reason other than politics and stupidity (over regulation, emotional fear mongering, ignorant baseless assumptions, etc.)

panick21_ 5y ago

While partly true, there is also a huge benefit of scale. And you need to actually hit way higher production numbers to truely hit economics of scale. Making 5 1.4GWe plants or making 24 300MWe doesnt garantee that it is much cheaper. Spezially if the 300MWe is a reactor of the same type. 300MWe PWRs will not be a huge benefit. Comparing a 500MWe (or even 1GWe) Molten Salt fueled reactor (or even Molten Salt cooled) will compare much better then any PWR, modular or not.

UltraViolence 5y ago
The article already points out that a 17 hour job at a site can be done in one hour at a factory. That's a huge savings factor right there! You don't need economies of scale to make SMR's profitable. They already are from the get go.
- panick21_ 5y ago
  I have seen a some of analysis that suggested that as long as you are working with PWR you are not gone do a huge amount better economically. It might be a little better, but we have to break free of water cooled reactor. It makes simply no sense as a design point. The only reason we have it is because it made sense for nuclear submarines.
  - UltraViolence 5y ago
    The cost gains are from standardized build templates with factory built components. Like I said, today's nuclear reactors are all bespoke builds.
    - panick21_ 5y ago
      Yes but as I pointed out, if you study mass production, the benefits of standardization and mass production are proportional to amount you produce. Going from producing 1 of something to 4 of something, the benefits are not actually that large. There is a far, far bigger effect going from PWR to a Molten Salt because that results in a factor 10 or more in difference in size of plant for the same output.