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Hmmm. 50 years old and out of action for half a decade. That’s going to require a lot of work to persuade the NRC it’s safe to operate. Given how difficult it
by rgmerk 2y ago
Hmmm. 50 years old and out of action for half a decade. That’s going to require a lot of work to persuade the NRC it’s safe to operate.
Given how difficult it’s proven to build new nuclear around the world, what are the odds of this recommissioning being on time and budget?
- weberer 2y agoThey're not restarting reactor 2. They're starting the one that shut down in 2019.
- AnimalMuppet 2y agoI think the GP knows that. That's why they said "out of action for half a decade".
- weberer 2y agoOh, I misread. Never mind then
- wffurr 2y ago2019 was half a decade ago.
- coolspot 2y agoOr a fifth of a century’s quarter.
- rdl 2y agoIf the recommissioning requires 20% of the work of new-build (in time and money), I'd rather have the "normal" 50-100% overrun in costs and time happen on recommissioning vs new-build. The delay is usually heavily on the permitting/legal challenges/etc. stage, not actual concrete-pouring and equipment installation, so an already-once-permitted site will probably do better relatively, too. Extra reactors at exising operating sites would make even more sense, though. Putting 2-4 extra AP-1000 at ~1GW/ea at each of the 54 facilities operating today would be huge and minimal incremental risk, and if there were a shortcut one time permitting process for it...
- mpweiher 2y agoIt turns out that nuclear is easy to build around the world. Average construction times have been more or less constant the last five decades and are currently at 6.5 years (trend: slightly falling). Median (typical) time is lower. https://www.sustainabilitybynumbers.com/p/nuclear-construction-time https://www.sustainabilitybynumbers.com/p/nuclear-constructi...
- rgmerk 2y agoAnd this particular refurbishment is in one of the countries with serious cost and schedule overruns for its nuclear build, and a country and specifically a region that is bad at physical infrastructure.
- mpweiher 2y agoThis is a country that simply hasn't built nuclear for ages. And the only one (two reactors) it did build was a brand new design (FOAK - First of a Kind). With COVID happening. Like everything, this gets better with practice.
- rgmerk 2y agoThis is a recommissioning of a 50 year old plant that’s been sitting idle for five years from an era when nuclear plants were all bespoke. Does that sound more like an nth of a kind project, or a first of a kind project?
- mpweiher 2y agoIt sounds like a refurbishment of a plant that was working just fine until 2019, not a new build of a design where you don't even know if it can be built. (The originally submitted Vogtle-3/4 design could not be built) In fact, last I checked they had already planned this refurbishment, but could not obtain the funds to do it, and thus shut down the plant instead. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯