4 ms·

While there aren't any flashy breakthrough nuclear technologies, we should remember that universities have been doing research and advancing nuclear technology

While there aren't any flashy breakthrough nuclear technologies, we should remember that universities have been doing research and advancing nuclear technology over the decades even when nuclear power plants weren't being built. The US military has wanted to maintain nuclear sciences and students, nuclear medicine has done a lot, material science has come a long ways for nuclear compatible materials, physics and nearly every branch of it has dipped its toes into if not dove right into learning about nuclear forces and nuclear chemistry. Fusion power requires understanding nuclear forces. And of course there are still people looking for the flashy nuclear power breakthrough. The reactors we see still operating today are mostly designed in like the 70s and 80s, some going back to the 60s, but that is only like 40 years after the invention of nuclear reactors and nuclear power, we are now over 40 years past that again, and our understanding of nuclear sciences is leaps and bounds above what we used to build most nuke plants in existance.

epistasis 1y ago
As far as reactors that could be deployed in the next 10 years, very optimistically we have: - Westinghouse AP1000 - EDF EPR - GE-Hitachi BWRX The AP1000 and EPR have been shown to be very underwhelming, in the US and Europe, respectively. Those failures are prompting Canada to look at the much smaller 300MW BWRX in Ontario. However before any cost-overruns the BWRX is getting priced at $14/W recently, and the eye-popping cost of the Vogtle AP1000 at $16/W has scared all potential builders away. If we could return to the older designs, we might be able to complete them at cheaper prices, but as our knowledge has advanced, nuclear has gotten more expensive.
- IMTDb 1y ago
  The European EPR aren’t underwhelming: the power plants are delivering precisely what was planned. The underwhelming part comes from delay and cost overruns caused by local political opposition and lack of vision, as well as difficulties finding builder with the required know-how. Despite this both France (which has just finished building an EPR) and the UK (which is building one right now) are doubling down and launching new projects to capitalise on the knowledge gained. In France all historical reactors worked so well that we did not feel the need to build more. This lead to talented engineers going to retirement without having a chance to pass on their knowledge and experience, causing cost overruns on the new constructions. This is not inherent to the technology itself but a symptom of our decision to put it aside for a while. As an example when I was in engineering school I remember being told “don’t do a nuclear physics major there is no job for that in the future”. Not easy retaining excellence in a field when that’s what you tell your children. All the dude that went there anyway are in very very high demand today, as you might expect. The new generation of reactors is more complex, mainly because of additional security and reliability requirements, which is a good thing. Those are certified for a lifespan of 60 years and costs are computed on that base. Some old gen reactors in the us are looking to extend their lifespan to 80 years. It’s extremely likely the new - safer - reactors will be able go beyond that, reducing the MW costs compared to current estimates. We are slowly re-learning to build reactors, and mastering a new technology at the same time. The more reactors we build based on that experience the more that initial cost will be distributed. There is nothing underwhelming in what was delivered; the process to get there was, but we will get better at that.
  - jeffbee 1y ago
    > difficulties finding builder If your ideal power plant can only be built by a hypothetical builder, then it cannot be built Literally a farmer can build a solar power plant.
    - chickenbig 1y ago
      > Literally a farmer can build a solar power plant. Can the farmer legally connect it to the grid in your location?
      - jeffbee 1y ago
        Yes? In California we adopted a streamlined process for new renewable connections. The first project was recently approved under the new lightweight process. It is being built by an irrigation district on a bunch of retired farmland. https://www.energy.ca.gov/news/2025-06/cec-approves-worlds-largest-solar-battery-storage-project-fresno-county-under https://www.energy.ca.gov/news/2025-06/cec-approves-worlds-l...
        chickenbig 1y ago
        "The Darden project, which is owned by IP Darden I, LLC, a subsidiary of Intersect Power" [0] "Intersect has closed ~$6B in project financings and raised ~$2.1B in corporate equity to support the buildout of clean energy assets including data center opportunities across the U.S." [1] Not exactly farmers. Solar farmers, perhaps. [0] https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2025/06/13/largest-battery-storage-project-wins-fast-track-approval-in-california/ https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2025/06/13/largest-battery-stora... [1] https://www.intersectpower.com/who-we-are/ https://www.intersectpower.com/who-we-are/
        chickenbig 1y ago
        Oh, note that Intersect Power has a commercial relationship with Google. [0] https://blog.google/inside-google/infrastructure/new-approach-to-data-center-and-clean-energy-growth/ https://blog.google/inside-google/infrastructure/new-approac...
- chickenbig 1y ago
  Let's not forget the GE-Hitachi (or is that Hitachi-GE) ABWR! CFR Part 52 license (the first one to get it) https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/cfr/part052/full-text.html#part052-appa https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/cfr/part052/f..., UK GDA license (of a variant) https://www.onr.org.uk/generic-design-assessment/assessment-of-reactors/uk-advanced-boiling-water-reactor-uk-abwr https://www.onr.org.uk/generic-design-assessment/assessment-...
  - natmaka 1y ago
    The BWRX seems way more adequate (safer, more affordable)... Let's check! Hitachi Nuclear, hard hit by the reactor shutdown in Japan following Fukushima, canceled projects, even in Europe (inherited through the acquisition of Horizon Nuclear Power) and even their R&D for Generation 3 (ABWR). Their overall move is moving them away from the energy sector (abandoning their wind turbine division in 2020). The deal with GE ("GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy") dates back to 2007 and has produced nothing to date: these large industrial companies (inertia...) with very different and poorly complementary cultures have not worked together, and none will be permanently based on the soil of their first customer (Canada). The combination of their resources and weak hopes will accentuate the difficulty of orchestrating a large two-headed project: Areva NP (French+German), worse. The BWRX design is truly innovative and very recent; no examples exist. Specification adjustments demanded on the fly by the safety authority will likely rain down, delaying and increasing the cost of the project. The client will be sensitive to this, having already suffered this (at Darlington, the host plant itself) and is experienced (Darlington has been in operation for 30 years). The customer is strict (their nuclear power is renowned for its good performance), well-positioned to benefit from the advice of US and French safety agencies (whose relevant institutes are interested in SMRs), and perhaps a little bitter about not being able to deploy their national CANDU. This SMR model has been optimized to be low-cost (series effect), which could (the magnitude of the side effects of certain modifications) make it difficult to adapt despite its modularity. I see a recipe for disaster likely to make the 4 EPR projects and Vogtle look like resounding successes.
    - epistasis 1y ago
      Honestly I think Canada should go back to the CANDU rather than the BWRX. As long as they don't modernize it too much to take advantage of "new technology" it might still be cheap. And they can use their own uranium, and not be dependent on the hostile nation to the south. You won't hear me say this very often, but the Decouple Pod is right: https://youtu.be/CXVHRkd3byg?si=-wqRibYVIOb-E75f https://youtu.be/CXVHRkd3byg?si=-wqRibYVIOb-E75f And the fuel flexibility of the CANDU brings all this back to the waste reprocessing original topic too!

epistasis 1y ago

As far as reactors that could be deployed in the next 10 years, very optimistically we have: - Westinghouse AP1000 - EDF EPR - GE-Hitachi BWRX The AP1000 and EPR have been shown to be very underwhelming, in the US and Europe, respectively. Those failures are prompting Canada to look at the much smaller 300MW BWRX in Ontario. However before any cost-overruns the BWRX is getting priced at $14/W recently, and the eye-popping cost of the Vogtle AP1000 at $16/W has scared all potential builders away. If we could return to the older designs, we might be able to complete them at cheaper prices, but as our knowledge has advanced, nuclear has gotten more expensive.

IMTDb 1y ago
The European EPR aren’t underwhelming: the power plants are delivering precisely what was planned. The underwhelming part comes from delay and cost overruns caused by local political opposition and lack of vision, as well as difficulties finding builder with the required know-how. Despite this both France (which has just finished building an EPR) and the UK (which is building one right now) are doubling down and launching new projects to capitalise on the knowledge gained. In France all historical reactors worked so well that we did not feel the need to build more. This lead to talented engineers going to retirement without having a chance to pass on their knowledge and experience, causing cost overruns on the new constructions. This is not inherent to the technology itself but a symptom of our decision to put it aside for a while. As an example when I was in engineering school I remember being told “don’t do a nuclear physics major there is no job for that in the future”. Not easy retaining excellence in a field when that’s what you tell your children. All the dude that went there anyway are in very very high demand today, as you might expect. The new generation of reactors is more complex, mainly because of additional security and reliability requirements, which is a good thing. Those are certified for a lifespan of 60 years and costs are computed on that base. Some old gen reactors in the us are looking to extend their lifespan to 80 years. It’s extremely likely the new - safer - reactors will be able go beyond that, reducing the MW costs compared to current estimates. We are slowly re-learning to build reactors, and mastering a new technology at the same time. The more reactors we build based on that experience the more that initial cost will be distributed. There is nothing underwhelming in what was delivered; the process to get there was, but we will get better at that.
- jeffbee 1y ago
  > difficulties finding builder If your ideal power plant can only be built by a hypothetical builder, then it cannot be built Literally a farmer can build a solar power plant.
  - chickenbig 1y ago
    > Literally a farmer can build a solar power plant. Can the farmer legally connect it to the grid in your location?
    - jeffbee 1y ago
      Yes? In California we adopted a streamlined process for new renewable connections. The first project was recently approved under the new lightweight process. It is being built by an irrigation district on a bunch of retired farmland. https://www.energy.ca.gov/news/2025-06/cec-approves-worlds-largest-solar-battery-storage-project-fresno-county-under https://www.energy.ca.gov/news/2025-06/cec-approves-worlds-l...
      - chickenbig 1y ago
        "The Darden project, which is owned by IP Darden I, LLC, a subsidiary of Intersect Power" [0] "Intersect has closed ~$6B in project financings and raised ~$2.1B in corporate equity to support the buildout of clean energy assets including data center opportunities across the U.S." [1] Not exactly farmers. Solar farmers, perhaps. [0] https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2025/06/13/largest-battery-storage-project-wins-fast-track-approval-in-california/ https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2025/06/13/largest-battery-stora... [1] https://www.intersectpower.com/who-we-are/ https://www.intersectpower.com/who-we-are/
        chickenbig 1y ago
        Oh, note that Intersect Power has a commercial relationship with Google. [0] https://blog.google/inside-google/infrastructure/new-approach-to-data-center-and-clean-energy-growth/ https://blog.google/inside-google/infrastructure/new-approac...
chickenbig 1y ago
Let's not forget the GE-Hitachi (or is that Hitachi-GE) ABWR! CFR Part 52 license (the first one to get it) https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/cfr/part052/full-text.html#part052-appa https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/cfr/part052/f..., UK GDA license (of a variant) https://www.onr.org.uk/generic-design-assessment/assessment-of-reactors/uk-advanced-boiling-water-reactor-uk-abwr https://www.onr.org.uk/generic-design-assessment/assessment-...
- natmaka 1y ago
  The BWRX seems way more adequate (safer, more affordable)... Let's check! Hitachi Nuclear, hard hit by the reactor shutdown in Japan following Fukushima, canceled projects, even in Europe (inherited through the acquisition of Horizon Nuclear Power) and even their R&D for Generation 3 (ABWR). Their overall move is moving them away from the energy sector (abandoning their wind turbine division in 2020). The deal with GE ("GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy") dates back to 2007 and has produced nothing to date: these large industrial companies (inertia...) with very different and poorly complementary cultures have not worked together, and none will be permanently based on the soil of their first customer (Canada). The combination of their resources and weak hopes will accentuate the difficulty of orchestrating a large two-headed project: Areva NP (French+German), worse. The BWRX design is truly innovative and very recent; no examples exist. Specification adjustments demanded on the fly by the safety authority will likely rain down, delaying and increasing the cost of the project. The client will be sensitive to this, having already suffered this (at Darlington, the host plant itself) and is experienced (Darlington has been in operation for 30 years). The customer is strict (their nuclear power is renowned for its good performance), well-positioned to benefit from the advice of US and French safety agencies (whose relevant institutes are interested in SMRs), and perhaps a little bitter about not being able to deploy their national CANDU. This SMR model has been optimized to be low-cost (series effect), which could (the magnitude of the side effects of certain modifications) make it difficult to adapt despite its modularity. I see a recipe for disaster likely to make the 4 EPR projects and Vogtle look like resounding successes.
  - epistasis 1y ago
    Honestly I think Canada should go back to the CANDU rather than the BWRX. As long as they don't modernize it too much to take advantage of "new technology" it might still be cheap. And they can use their own uranium, and not be dependent on the hostile nation to the south. You won't hear me say this very often, but the Decouple Pod is right: https://youtu.be/CXVHRkd3byg?si=-wqRibYVIOb-E75f https://youtu.be/CXVHRkd3byg?si=-wqRibYVIOb-E75f And the fuel flexibility of the CANDU brings all this back to the waste reprocessing original topic too!