3 ms·

> willing to take the financial risk of nuclear There are multiple nuclear (fission) startups in the last decade or so. My understanding is that financial bac

• epistasis 4y ago
  It's one thing to spend a fraction of $1B backing a startup that says it has a new small modular design that will finally turn around the economics, and have a big upside. It's a far far more difficult thing to risk $10B on a reactor that may or may not actually ever complete construction, and has no potential for growth in value. People never seem to cite which regulations they want to change. The NRC allowed the AP1000 at Vogtle and Summer to be constructed under a new regulatory regime at the request of industry, but the industry still seemed to mess up their construction process. And France at Flamanville has also had terrible construction problems despite having different and friendly regulatory processes. My main problem with the nuclear industry is that it continually fails to focus on what would actually deliver nuclear, and just complains about everybody else instead of improving process or becoming accountable for results.
  • MisterMower 4y ago
    To be fair, they have a lot to complain about. You know how they discovered radon gas was a problem in basements? A guy working at a nuclear power plant showed up at work one day and tripped their radiation detectors. There was more radiation in a random guy’s basement than at the entire nuclear plant. Meanwhile, the Chinese are soaking up US subsidy money for producing solar panels using slave labor. They strip mine for toxic rare earth metals to do it, destroying the environment and using coal power to boot. I think their complaints are justified.