5 ms·

Forgotten History of Small Nuclear Reactors (2015)

49 points by derriz 29d ago

ggm 24d ago
... cracks .... cracking ... cracked .. cracks.. there's a remarkable similarity to the life of these units. They worked, until they didn't. "ah, but we're much wiser now" is of course in this too.
- leonidasrup 24d ago
  We are much wiser now, because the nuclear industry learns and improves. Similar evolution can be seen for example in aircraft industry, flying in 1970s was much more dangerous with many more incidents then flying now. https://www.voronoiapp.com/travel/Airplane-Safety-Timeline-1970-2024-3876 https://www.voronoiapp.com/travel/Airplane-Safety-Timeline-1... https://accidentstats.airbus.com/fatal-accidents/ https://accidentstats.airbus.com/fatal-accidents/
  - 0bytes 24d ago
    And yet there are still occasional accidents. 51 in 2025. Which end tragic in aviation but are so much more severe for nuclear power plants.
    - leonidasrup 24d ago
      The severity of nuclear power plant failures is also decreasing. "Radiation effects from the Fukushima nuclear accident" "A June 2012 Stanford University study estimated, using a linear no-threshold model, that the radioactivity release from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant could cause 130 deaths from cancer globally (the lower bound for the estimate being 15 and the upper bound 1100) and 199 cancer cases in total (the lower bound being 24 and the upper bound 1800), most of which are estimated to occur in Japan. Radiation exposure to workers at the plant was projected to result in 2 to 12 deaths. However, a December 2012 UNSCEAR statement to the Fukushima Ministerial Conference on Nuclear Safety advised that "because of the great uncertainties in risk estimates at very low doses, UNSCEAR does not recommend multiplying very low doses by large numbers of individuals to estimate numbers of radiation-induced health effects within a population exposed to incremental doses at levels equivalent to or lower than natural background levels."" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_effects_from_the_Fukushima_nuclear_accident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_effects_from_the_Fuk...
      - 0bytes 24d ago
        The power plant is in a very rural area with estimations of 100 people per square kilometer. Tokai Daini is in an area with approx 10 times the people compared to Fukushima. It’s only 8 meters above sea level and it’s also in risk of a tsunami in general. From my point of view that’s not an argument for the safety of nuclear power but more a “it didn’t happen this time”
        leonidasrup 24d ago
        It's argument for the safety of nuclear power, because 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami (Earthquake was the most powerful ever recorded in Japan, and the fourth most powerful recorded in the world since modern seismography began in 1900) caused over 15,000 deaths. In contrast the meltdown of Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant started by the tsunami caused much less deaths. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_T%C5%8Dhoku_earthquake_and_tsunami https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_T%C5%8Dhoku_earthquake_an... Would a similar earthquake and tsunami cause 150 000 deaths, if it happen near Tōkai? Nuclear operators studied the reasons for meltdown of Fukushima Daiichi NPP (failure to restore cooling after wide spread destruction of infrastructure around nuclear power plant and flooding of backup diesel generators underground) and have prepared steps to prevent it in other power plants (aditional backup diesel generators mounted in higher places, helicopter transport of spare cooling equipment when roads are destroyed). "As an example, the French Nuclear Safety Authority (ASN) initiated an assessment of the country’s 56 nuclear power reactors as well as the 2 EPR reactors under construction. The ASN then prescribed the implementation of both fixed and mobile equipment that could potentially prevent a large release, including high-resistance diesel generators and pumps able to function in extreme scenarios such as major earthquakes or flooding. The availability of alternative sources of water for cooling was also prescribed under the same conditions. In addition, the ASN required a back-up plan including rapid action force groups that can be on site within 24 hours with light equipment and within three days with heavy equipment, using transportation means such as helicopters, and that can operate in a severely disrupted environment." https://www.iaea.org/bulletin/ensuring-the-safety-of-nuclear-installations-lessons-learned-from-the-fukushima-daiichi-accident https://www.iaea.org/bulletin/ensuring-the-safety-of-nuclear...
- 0bytes 24d ago
  How much wiser do we need to be to build a large number of nuclear reactors? How much safer is each one compared to a larger one to justify the risk of building more items that can end in a disaster? And aren’t large reactors quite uneconomical already? How much worse do small ones operate, given the economy of scale. Nuclear power just didn’t deliver what it promised. The uranium mines of the GDR resulted in 311 million cubic meters of mine waste. In 2005 for the the remediation 13.75 million liters of Diesel fuel were used. The costs so far have been 7.4 billion €. About 20 Billion € were invested in nuclear plants that never produced any power (or in one case was shut down after 100 days) in Germany. Add the costs of deconstruction of the existing plants. The whole narrative of cheap power is nothing but a house of cards.
riffraff 24d ago
Seems there's no mention of Russia in the article, but they seem to have a rich tradition of small reactors[0]. My understanding is there's still ongoing research/commercialization work but the fabled "many and cheap" production state hasn't been reached there either [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Russian_small_nuclear_reactors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Russian_small_nuclear_...
- leonidasrup 24d ago
  The list of installed VVER-440 reactors (slightly larger then the official definition of SMR - rated electrical power of less than 300 megawatts (MWe)) is long: WWER-440 V-230 reactor B179 - Units 3 and 4 of the Novovoronezh NPP (Russia) B230 - 1, 2 units of the Kola NPP (Russia) 1, 2, 3, 4 units of the Kozloduy NPP (Bulgaria) Units 1, 2, 3, 4 of the Greifswald NPP (Germany) 1, 2 units of Bohunice NPP (Slovakia) WWER-440 V-213 reactor plant 3, 4 blocks of the Kola NPP (Russia) Units 1, 2, 3, 4 of the Paks Nuclear Power Plant (Hungary) Units 1, 2, 3, 4 of the Dukovany Nuclear Power Plant (Czech Republic) Units 1 and 2 of the Loviisa NPP (Finland); 3, 4 units of the Bohunice NPP (Slovakia) 1, 2 units of Rivne NPP (Ukraine) Units 5, 6, 7, 8 of the Greifswald Nuclear Power Plant (Germany) WWER-440 V-270 reactor plant B-270 — 1, 2 blocks of the Armenian Nuclear Power Plant ( Armenia ) https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%92%D0%92%D0%AD%D0%A0-440 https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%92%D0%92%D0%AD%D0%A0-440
  - SiempreViernes 24d ago
    > Units 3 and 4 of the Novovoronezh NPP So "small" here means a 150 meter long building.
    - leonidasrup 23d ago
      SMR - rated electrical power of less than 300 megawatts (MWe), says nothing about physical dimensions of the plant. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_modular_reactor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_modular_reactor There were even discussion about modifications of AP-600 reactor to 300 MWe, so it could be offered in SMR projects. There are customer who want only SMR or only allow SMR to be build. For example, Illinois had 36-year-old moratorium on nuclear construction. In 2023 lawmakers approved the House Bill 2473, this lifted the moratorium on nuclear construction, but only for SMR, not for larger reactors. https://will.illinois.edu/studentnewsroom/story/lifted-moratorium-will-allow-illinois-to-build-new-nuclear-reactors https://will.illinois.edu/studentnewsroom/story/lifted-morat... I think that the definition of SMR is incorrect. One should not limit electric output, the important metric is total cost of the project.
bruce511 24d ago
Look, I prefer nuclear over fossil fuel every day of the week. It's the great hope of the non-carbon electricity sources. In practice it is expensive to build, expensive to run, and really expensive to clean up. And that's before we add the risk of meltdowns. Economically it makes no sense, not at the returns level, not at the timescale level, and certainly not at the political level. (If a US president can shutter an offshore wind farm unilaterally, imagine the risk to a nuclear plant that is 50% complete, and not yet fueled.) There's a reason they're mostly run by govts. Govts are the only providers who don't have a money motive. Personally I think research into storage, coupled with "wider" grids geographically, make solar and wind far more financially attractive. Private capital has no appetite for nuclear, and few govts are left with both financial ability, and political will, for 30 year projects. And if you think fission is expensive, wait till you find out what fusion-on-earth costs...
- dalyons 24d ago
  Nuke fanboys hate this one weird trick (economics)
  - rightnutwingjob 24d ago
    “Nuclear is too expensive.” Enter pumped hydro: The $12 billion Snowy 2.0 scheme will cop further cost and timeline blowouts, auditors say, but the project has been beset with management failures and the government-owned corporation delivering the project cannot yet say how much more it will cost and how much longer it will take.[1] My proposed solution: invite any of the 31 nuclear power reactor operating countries over to Australia to build them for us, and teach us how to do it. 1. https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/extreme-risk-of-yet-more-cost-construction-blowouts-at-snowy-2-0-20260618-p6082n.html https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/extreme-risk-of-yet-...
    - leonidasrup 24d ago
      "A 2009 poll conducted by the Uranium Information Centre found that Australians in the 40 to 55 years age group are the "most trenchantly opposed to nuclear power". This generation was raised during the Cold War, experienced the anti-nuclear movement of the 1970s, witnessed the 1979 partial meltdown of the Three Mile Island reactor in the US, and the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. It was the generation which was also subject to cultural influences including feature films such as the "nuclear industry conspiracies" The China Syndrome and Silkwood and the apocalyptic Dr Strangelove. Younger people are "less resistant" to the idea of nuclear power in Australia. Analysis of opinion polls from 2012 shows a "significant decrease in favourable views of nuclear power" following the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-nuclear_movement_in_Australia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-nuclear_movement_in_Austr... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Australia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Australia Decarbonisation is very much discussed in Australia, but not much progress has been done, because coal and natural gas is cheap in Australia. Australia also one of the largest coal exporters in the world. https://www.csiro.au/en/research/environmental-impacts/decarbonisation/pathways-for-Australia-report https://www.csiro.au/en/research/environmental-impacts/decar... https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-co2-emissions-per-country?time=1988..latest&country=AUS~NZL~BHR~CAN https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-co2-emissions-per-... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_natural_gas_production https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_natural_g... https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/coal-exports-by-country https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/coal-expo...
Honali 24d ago
What I find interesting is how little the sales pitch seems to have changed. "Yes, smaller reactors lose economies of scale, but we'll make it up through factory production, standardization and repetition" apparently sounded plausible in the 1950s too
- preisschild 24d ago
  > "Yes, smaller reactors lose economies of scale, but we'll make it up through factory production, standardization and repetition" Why not both? Large Modular Reactors (LMR). You can produce standardized modules in a factory and ship them via barges to their final destination. See for example: https://whatisnuclear.com/offshore-nuclear-plants.html https://whatisnuclear.com/offshore-nuclear-plants.html
  - roryirvine 24d ago
    Then you have the additional expense of bringing the power ashore, and of building the breakwater. Most coastal sites are environmentally sensitive - think of Trump's hatred for offshore wind turbines, and imagine how people would feel about something so much more massive! But in a slightly more-plausible vein, Rolls Royce are pushing mid-sized MRs in the 0.5 GW range, with the selling point that they can be built on the location of ex-fossil fuel or 1st gen nuclear power plants. They're still more expensive per MWh than a modern large nuclear plant, but have the benefit of reusing existing grid connections and other infrastructure. Whether that's actually enough to make them a commercial success is another matter, but there's a chance they could prove a useful stopgap until grid-scale storage costs come down further.
  - testdelacc1 24d ago
    Why not Large Modular reactors? You’ll produce fewer of every component, making it less feasible to set up an assembly line for it. You’ll build everything bespoke, because you’ll only build it a few times. But assembly as well. People learn by doing. The second reactor will be built quicker than the first and third will be quicker than the second. And you can see it in the Rolls-Royce order book. 3 separate countries have ordered 3 reactors to start with. An order book of 9 reactors strongly incentivises setting up an assembly line.
leonidasrup 24d ago
The author of the article "M. V. Ramana" is long-time opponent of nuclear energy , mostly because of nuclear weapon proliferation concerns. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M._V._Ramana https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M._V._Ramana See for example: "Bombing Bombay? Effects of Nuclear Weapons and a Case Study of a Hypothetical Explosion", 1999 International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) https://www.ippnw.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Bombing-Bombay.pdf https://www.ippnw.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Bombing-Bom... "Costing plutonium: economics of reprocessing in India", M.V. Ramana, J.Y. Suchitra, 2007 https://www.geocities.ws/m_v_ramana/nucleararticles/IJGEI_Vol27_No4_Reprocessing.pdf https://www.geocities.ws/m_v_ramana/nucleararticles/IJGEI_Vo... "India, Pakistan and the Bomb", Scientific American, 2001 https://nci.org/01/12/07-08.pdf https://nci.org/01/12/07-08.pdf
- walrus01 24d ago
  Perhaps he took the Vancouver "nuclear weapons free zone" signs a little too seriously. https://www.google.com/search?num=10&client=firefox-b-d&hs=ddYq&sca_esv=310041c079f8198e&sxsrf=APpeQntu7dbroWHyJrqRlHOh9v4_mBDIcg:1788337689154&udm=2&fbs=ABfTbFVyMZGZf1hfvX9uKjN_-G8c4u0nXx4bEIpwm1lnNH832QGGMdFXpDyzkQgEdtB8w9w-GD6PIjvNPpUnrx3WoOVIqtB7m0uJCnmO69VZCGvjkJswfxpqShzBmeU9vLtlIzopjL8GevC4L9ZTknjTuyYZNj4rl0Pk-t4SeTNeAmp10bOTcyvZqzFfmS8fciEJ7KhLnD1qFLzhkL7sE4rUaTzQUcLYHA&q=vancouver+nuclear+free+zone+sign&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwij9syFvc-WAxWZKzQIHQq5CUAQtKgLegQIFhAB&biw=1680&bih=941&dpr=2 https://www.google.com/search?num=10&client=firefox-b-d&hs=d...
  - leonidasrup 24d ago
    Dr M.V. Ramana argued for establishing a nuclear weapons free zone in the Middle East, even criticizing United States approach towards nuclear armed Israel. https://www.cndpindia.org/a-nuclear-weapons-free-zone-in-the-middle-east-the-elephant-in-the-room/ https://www.cndpindia.org/a-nuclear-weapons-free-zone-in-the... "Dr M.V. Ramana, Professor and Simons Chair in Disarmament, Global and Human Security at the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs (SPPGA), University of British Columbia, Vancouver, told IPS establishing a nuclear weapons free zone in the Middle East is not only a major challenge but it is also important. The challenge is primarily due to Israel’s refusal to not just discuss its decades-old nuclear weapons program but even acknowledge it, while at the same time attacking countries like Iran over even its nuclear energy-related programs, he argued. Being backed by the United States, which adopts one rule for Israel and another rule for other countries, it is very difficult to involve Israel, said Dr Ramana, who is also Director of the Liu Institute for Global Issues and the Acting Director of the Centre for India and South Asia Research (CISAR) in the Institute of Asian Research."
jl6 24d ago
Feels like there is a "too small" range where fixed costs make a reactor design uneconomic, and perhaps a "too big" range where they cost so much that they are rare strategic investments without the benefit of a production line. Is there a happy medium? Some of the modern SMR proposals aren't all that small. There's a 470MW Rolls Royce unit, for example.
- fuoqi 24d ago
  The existing "big" nuclear reactors are already more or less in the "happy" range. The problem is irregular building schedule (you can have 10 reactors in works today and 0 for the next 50 years) and extreme regulatory overhead. Ideally, you need a "pipeline" with one reactor being built every 2-5 years and streamlined regulatory environment where you can use the same project "template" with minimal adjustments. This way building expertise is not lost (i.e. the industry does not need to re-learn everything for every project, which is very costly) and even can be accumulated to reduce costs further. It applies not only to the building part, but also to regulatory bodies. The problem is that you need to operate ~100 reactors for this, so it can work only for large economies able to provide the "baseline" demand. China and to a lesser extent Russia do this, which does result in significantly lower nuclear plant building costs for them. Europe, SK, and US have dropped the ball hard here.
  - jl6 24d ago
    I think “medium” is a key enabler for being able to sustain a regular schedule of reactor building. It’s way easier to raise $3bn every 3 years than $30bn every 30 years.
pidgeon_lover 24d ago
Nuclear's great until you have a natural disaster or war. Then every single reactor is a potential Chernobyl. The less of those around, the better.
- 0bytes 24d ago
  And the waste, and the environmental impact on fuel mining, and the deconstruction, and the inherent risks, but otherwise yes, it’s great!
- harrouet 24d ago
  This is absolutely not true. Actually, nuclear is safer than, say, hydraulic power. With that said, it requires a country with good governance and an independent safety regulator (like in France).
- bell-cot 24d ago
  Nuclear power, as actually implemented in most human societies, is obviously not so great. If it was, we'd have far more of it. And while the combination of natural disasters & war with nuclear power is great for pushing people's emotional buttons, the reality isn't particularly bad. What % of the casualties from the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami were related to the Fukushima plant? What % of the casualties in the Ukraine war have been related to the nuclear plants there? Yes, Putin can talk big about doing all sorts of creepy-scary things related to those nuclear plants. Especially if his doing so gets the sorts of reactions that he wants. But Putin can also talk big about using nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons in Ukraine. Or just order the destruction of a hydroelectric dam - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kakhovka_Dam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kakhovka_Dam - which caused plenty of death and destruction.
- leonidasrup 23d ago
  Current operating reactors don't have the design, constructions and operational flaws of Chernobyl. Current reactors don't have large positive void coefficient, instabilities at low power levels, manual controlling, slow control rods movements, computers from the 1960s. Your mobile phone can do more computation in a milisecond that Chernobyl could do in minutes. " SKALA (Russian: СКАЛА, система контроля аппарата Ленинградской Атомной; sistema kontrolya apparata Leningradskoj Atomnoj, "Control system of the device of the Leningrad Nuclear [Power Plant]", lit. "rock") was the process computer for the RBMK nuclear reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant prior to October 1995. Dating to the 1960s, it used magnetic-core memory, magnetic tape data storage, and punched tape for loading software. SKALA monitored and recorded reactor conditions and control board inputs. It was wired to accept 7200 analog signals and 6500 digital signals. The system continuously monitored the plant and displayed this information to operators. Additionally, a program called PRIZMA (Russian: ПРИЗМА, программа измерения мощности аппарата; programma izmereniya moshchnosti apparata, "Device power measurement program", lit. "prism") processed plant conditions and made recommendations to guide plant operators. This program took 5 to 10 minutes to run, and could not directly control the reactor" " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_Nuclear_Power_Plant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_Nuclear_Power_Plant As a side note, there are currently still 7 RBMK reactors in operation, in Russia. But they use modern computers, modern instrumentation and control, different composition of nuclear fuel.
harrouet 24d ago
I always get touchy when someone compares the cost of nuclear MWh to the ones of solar and wind turbines, because they are essentially NOT the same MWh. Nuclear works 24x7 on its own. Intermittent energies don't. Intermittent energies need a whole infrastructure on their side (usually gas / coal power plants) to guarantee 24x7 electricity. This cost should be factored in. If you are not convinced, think about your cell phone service: would you pay the same for a network that works only when it is sunny ? No. Not the same. NB: don't even mention batteries, when the largest scale projects, very expensive, can only supply power for a few minutes at grid scale.
- derriz 24d ago
  Nuclear is also intermittent - ask Europeans. During January this year, nuclear contributed about 62TWh of the electricity generated in the EU while in June this had fallen to 43.7TWh - about a 30% decrease. The deficit was largely filled by a surge of solar generation as well as burning more gas. The drop was due to both scheduled and unscheduled downtime. There is no such thing as a non-intermittent source - even without unscheduled outages, a typical nuclear plant spends over 4 weeks offline a year. You need to be able to handle that also - i.e. with redundancy and backup. Also because nuclear (like coal - the other thermal steam generation tech) requires huge scale to be profitable, it requires huge transmission investment. Contrast this with solar, for example, which is economic to scale down and can deployed in a more distributed pattern.
  - harrouet 24d ago
    First, overall consumption is smaller in June than in January, when days are shorter and heating is on. So I don't see how comparing these 2 numbers makes a relevant argument. Second, you can't compare technical (planned) maintenance with the uncontrolled intermittence of wind or solar. Not having sun or wind during peak demand is the actual problem. In Europe, peak demand is 6-8pm in winter: no sun, no wind. The last problematic preventive maintenance, mandated by the supervising agency, which forced France to import MWh for a few months was in 2022. Anything human-made can have a downtime. It was actually a voluntary (although mandated) downtime in this case. Moreover, you may not know that nuclear is forced to reduce output when intermittent energies increase their output. There is no good technical reason for this, it is just how the regulation has been made (you can imagine lobbying entities asking for it). You may have noticed more sun in June than in January, so yes nuclear may have had to reduce output. Not due to the technology.

49 points by derriz 29d ago

ggm 24d ago

... cracks .... cracking ... cracked .. cracks.. there's a remarkable similarity to the life of these units. They worked, until they didn't. "ah, but we're much wiser now" is of course in this too.

leonidasrup 24d ago
We are much wiser now, because the nuclear industry learns and improves. Similar evolution can be seen for example in aircraft industry, flying in 1970s was much more dangerous with many more incidents then flying now. https://www.voronoiapp.com/travel/Airplane-Safety-Timeline-1970-2024-3876 https://www.voronoiapp.com/travel/Airplane-Safety-Timeline-1... https://accidentstats.airbus.com/fatal-accidents/ https://accidentstats.airbus.com/fatal-accidents/
- 0bytes 24d ago
  And yet there are still occasional accidents. 51 in 2025. Which end tragic in aviation but are so much more severe for nuclear power plants.
  - leonidasrup 24d ago
    The severity of nuclear power plant failures is also decreasing. "Radiation effects from the Fukushima nuclear accident" "A June 2012 Stanford University study estimated, using a linear no-threshold model, that the radioactivity release from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant could cause 130 deaths from cancer globally (the lower bound for the estimate being 15 and the upper bound 1100) and 199 cancer cases in total (the lower bound being 24 and the upper bound 1800), most of which are estimated to occur in Japan. Radiation exposure to workers at the plant was projected to result in 2 to 12 deaths. However, a December 2012 UNSCEAR statement to the Fukushima Ministerial Conference on Nuclear Safety advised that "because of the great uncertainties in risk estimates at very low doses, UNSCEAR does not recommend multiplying very low doses by large numbers of individuals to estimate numbers of radiation-induced health effects within a population exposed to incremental doses at levels equivalent to or lower than natural background levels."" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_effects_from_the_Fukushima_nuclear_accident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_effects_from_the_Fuk...
    - 0bytes 24d ago
      The power plant is in a very rural area with estimations of 100 people per square kilometer. Tokai Daini is in an area with approx 10 times the people compared to Fukushima. It’s only 8 meters above sea level and it’s also in risk of a tsunami in general. From my point of view that’s not an argument for the safety of nuclear power but more a “it didn’t happen this time”
      - leonidasrup 24d ago
        It's argument for the safety of nuclear power, because 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami (Earthquake was the most powerful ever recorded in Japan, and the fourth most powerful recorded in the world since modern seismography began in 1900) caused over 15,000 deaths. In contrast the meltdown of Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant started by the tsunami caused much less deaths. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_T%C5%8Dhoku_earthquake_and_tsunami https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_T%C5%8Dhoku_earthquake_an... Would a similar earthquake and tsunami cause 150 000 deaths, if it happen near Tōkai? Nuclear operators studied the reasons for meltdown of Fukushima Daiichi NPP (failure to restore cooling after wide spread destruction of infrastructure around nuclear power plant and flooding of backup diesel generators underground) and have prepared steps to prevent it in other power plants (aditional backup diesel generators mounted in higher places, helicopter transport of spare cooling equipment when roads are destroyed). "As an example, the French Nuclear Safety Authority (ASN) initiated an assessment of the country’s 56 nuclear power reactors as well as the 2 EPR reactors under construction. The ASN then prescribed the implementation of both fixed and mobile equipment that could potentially prevent a large release, including high-resistance diesel generators and pumps able to function in extreme scenarios such as major earthquakes or flooding. The availability of alternative sources of water for cooling was also prescribed under the same conditions. In addition, the ASN required a back-up plan including rapid action force groups that can be on site within 24 hours with light equipment and within three days with heavy equipment, using transportation means such as helicopters, and that can operate in a severely disrupted environment." https://www.iaea.org/bulletin/ensuring-the-safety-of-nuclear-installations-lessons-learned-from-the-fukushima-daiichi-accident https://www.iaea.org/bulletin/ensuring-the-safety-of-nuclear...
0bytes 24d ago
How much wiser do we need to be to build a large number of nuclear reactors? How much safer is each one compared to a larger one to justify the risk of building more items that can end in a disaster? And aren’t large reactors quite uneconomical already? How much worse do small ones operate, given the economy of scale. Nuclear power just didn’t deliver what it promised. The uranium mines of the GDR resulted in 311 million cubic meters of mine waste. In 2005 for the the remediation 13.75 million liters of Diesel fuel were used. The costs so far have been 7.4 billion €. About 20 Billion € were invested in nuclear plants that never produced any power (or in one case was shut down after 100 days) in Germany. Add the costs of deconstruction of the existing plants. The whole narrative of cheap power is nothing but a house of cards.

riffraff 24d ago

Seems there's no mention of Russia in the article, but they seem to have a rich tradition of small reactors[0]. My understanding is there's still ongoing research/commercialization work but the fabled "many and cheap" production state hasn't been reached there either [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Russian_small_nuclear_reactors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Russian_small_nuclear_...

leonidasrup 24d ago
The list of installed VVER-440 reactors (slightly larger then the official definition of SMR - rated electrical power of less than 300 megawatts (MWe)) is long: WWER-440 V-230 reactor B179 - Units 3 and 4 of the Novovoronezh NPP (Russia) B230 - 1, 2 units of the Kola NPP (Russia) 1, 2, 3, 4 units of the Kozloduy NPP (Bulgaria) Units 1, 2, 3, 4 of the Greifswald NPP (Germany) 1, 2 units of Bohunice NPP (Slovakia) WWER-440 V-213 reactor plant 3, 4 blocks of the Kola NPP (Russia) Units 1, 2, 3, 4 of the Paks Nuclear Power Plant (Hungary) Units 1, 2, 3, 4 of the Dukovany Nuclear Power Plant (Czech Republic) Units 1 and 2 of the Loviisa NPP (Finland); 3, 4 units of the Bohunice NPP (Slovakia) 1, 2 units of Rivne NPP (Ukraine) Units 5, 6, 7, 8 of the Greifswald Nuclear Power Plant (Germany) WWER-440 V-270 reactor plant B-270 — 1, 2 blocks of the Armenian Nuclear Power Plant ( Armenia ) https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%92%D0%92%D0%AD%D0%A0-440 https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%92%D0%92%D0%AD%D0%A0-440
- SiempreViernes 24d ago
  > Units 3 and 4 of the Novovoronezh NPP So "small" here means a 150 meter long building.
  - leonidasrup 23d ago
    SMR - rated electrical power of less than 300 megawatts (MWe), says nothing about physical dimensions of the plant. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_modular_reactor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_modular_reactor There were even discussion about modifications of AP-600 reactor to 300 MWe, so it could be offered in SMR projects. There are customer who want only SMR or only allow SMR to be build. For example, Illinois had 36-year-old moratorium on nuclear construction. In 2023 lawmakers approved the House Bill 2473, this lifted the moratorium on nuclear construction, but only for SMR, not for larger reactors. https://will.illinois.edu/studentnewsroom/story/lifted-moratorium-will-allow-illinois-to-build-new-nuclear-reactors https://will.illinois.edu/studentnewsroom/story/lifted-morat... I think that the definition of SMR is incorrect. One should not limit electric output, the important metric is total cost of the project.

bruce511 24d ago

Look, I prefer nuclear over fossil fuel every day of the week. It's the great hope of the non-carbon electricity sources. In practice it is expensive to build, expensive to run, and really expensive to clean up. And that's before we add the risk of meltdowns. Economically it makes no sense, not at the returns level, not at the timescale level, and certainly not at the political level. (If a US president can shutter an offshore wind farm unilaterally, imagine the risk to a nuclear plant that is 50% complete, and not yet fueled.) There's a reason they're mostly run by govts. Govts are the only providers who don't have a money motive. Personally I think research into storage, coupled with "wider" grids geographically, make solar and wind far more financially attractive. Private capital has no appetite for nuclear, and few govts are left with both financial ability, and political will, for 30 year projects. And if you think fission is expensive, wait till you find out what fusion-on-earth costs...

dalyons 24d ago
Nuke fanboys hate this one weird trick (economics)
- rightnutwingjob 24d ago
  “Nuclear is too expensive.” Enter pumped hydro: The $12 billion Snowy 2.0 scheme will cop further cost and timeline blowouts, auditors say, but the project has been beset with management failures and the government-owned corporation delivering the project cannot yet say how much more it will cost and how much longer it will take.[1] My proposed solution: invite any of the 31 nuclear power reactor operating countries over to Australia to build them for us, and teach us how to do it. 1. https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/extreme-risk-of-yet-more-cost-construction-blowouts-at-snowy-2-0-20260618-p6082n.html https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/extreme-risk-of-yet-...
  - leonidasrup 24d ago
    "A 2009 poll conducted by the Uranium Information Centre found that Australians in the 40 to 55 years age group are the "most trenchantly opposed to nuclear power". This generation was raised during the Cold War, experienced the anti-nuclear movement of the 1970s, witnessed the 1979 partial meltdown of the Three Mile Island reactor in the US, and the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. It was the generation which was also subject to cultural influences including feature films such as the "nuclear industry conspiracies" The China Syndrome and Silkwood and the apocalyptic Dr Strangelove. Younger people are "less resistant" to the idea of nuclear power in Australia. Analysis of opinion polls from 2012 shows a "significant decrease in favourable views of nuclear power" following the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-nuclear_movement_in_Australia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-nuclear_movement_in_Austr... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Australia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Australia Decarbonisation is very much discussed in Australia, but not much progress has been done, because coal and natural gas is cheap in Australia. Australia also one of the largest coal exporters in the world. https://www.csiro.au/en/research/environmental-impacts/decarbonisation/pathways-for-Australia-report https://www.csiro.au/en/research/environmental-impacts/decar... https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-co2-emissions-per-country?time=1988..latest&country=AUS~NZL~BHR~CAN https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-co2-emissions-per-... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_natural_gas_production https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_natural_g... https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/coal-exports-by-country https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/coal-expo...

Honali 24d ago

What I find interesting is how little the sales pitch seems to have changed. "Yes, smaller reactors lose economies of scale, but we'll make it up through factory production, standardization and repetition" apparently sounded plausible in the 1950s too

preisschild 24d ago
> "Yes, smaller reactors lose economies of scale, but we'll make it up through factory production, standardization and repetition" Why not both? Large Modular Reactors (LMR). You can produce standardized modules in a factory and ship them via barges to their final destination. See for example: https://whatisnuclear.com/offshore-nuclear-plants.html https://whatisnuclear.com/offshore-nuclear-plants.html
- roryirvine 24d ago
  Then you have the additional expense of bringing the power ashore, and of building the breakwater. Most coastal sites are environmentally sensitive - think of Trump's hatred for offshore wind turbines, and imagine how people would feel about something so much more massive! But in a slightly more-plausible vein, Rolls Royce are pushing mid-sized MRs in the 0.5 GW range, with the selling point that they can be built on the location of ex-fossil fuel or 1st gen nuclear power plants. They're still more expensive per MWh than a modern large nuclear plant, but have the benefit of reusing existing grid connections and other infrastructure. Whether that's actually enough to make them a commercial success is another matter, but there's a chance they could prove a useful stopgap until grid-scale storage costs come down further.
- testdelacc1 24d ago
  Why not Large Modular reactors? You’ll produce fewer of every component, making it less feasible to set up an assembly line for it. You’ll build everything bespoke, because you’ll only build it a few times. But assembly as well. People learn by doing. The second reactor will be built quicker than the first and third will be quicker than the second. And you can see it in the Rolls-Royce order book. 3 separate countries have ordered 3 reactors to start with. An order book of 9 reactors strongly incentivises setting up an assembly line.

leonidasrup 24d ago

The author of the article "M. V. Ramana" is long-time opponent of nuclear energy , mostly because of nuclear weapon proliferation concerns. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M._V._Ramana https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M._V._Ramana See for example: "Bombing Bombay? Effects of Nuclear Weapons and a Case Study of a Hypothetical Explosion", 1999 International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) https://www.ippnw.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Bombing-Bombay.pdf https://www.ippnw.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Bombing-Bom... "Costing plutonium: economics of reprocessing in India", M.V. Ramana, J.Y. Suchitra, 2007 https://www.geocities.ws/m_v_ramana/nucleararticles/IJGEI_Vol27_No4_Reprocessing.pdf https://www.geocities.ws/m_v_ramana/nucleararticles/IJGEI_Vo... "India, Pakistan and the Bomb", Scientific American, 2001 https://nci.org/01/12/07-08.pdf https://nci.org/01/12/07-08.pdf

walrus01 24d ago
Perhaps he took the Vancouver "nuclear weapons free zone" signs a little too seriously. https://www.google.com/search?num=10&client=firefox-b-d&hs=ddYq&sca_esv=310041c079f8198e&sxsrf=APpeQntu7dbroWHyJrqRlHOh9v4_mBDIcg:1788337689154&udm=2&fbs=ABfTbFVyMZGZf1hfvX9uKjN_-G8c4u0nXx4bEIpwm1lnNH832QGGMdFXpDyzkQgEdtB8w9w-GD6PIjvNPpUnrx3WoOVIqtB7m0uJCnmO69VZCGvjkJswfxpqShzBmeU9vLtlIzopjL8GevC4L9ZTknjTuyYZNj4rl0Pk-t4SeTNeAmp10bOTcyvZqzFfmS8fciEJ7KhLnD1qFLzhkL7sE4rUaTzQUcLYHA&q=vancouver+nuclear+free+zone+sign&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwij9syFvc-WAxWZKzQIHQq5CUAQtKgLegQIFhAB&biw=1680&bih=941&dpr=2 https://www.google.com/search?num=10&client=firefox-b-d&hs=d...
- leonidasrup 24d ago
  Dr M.V. Ramana argued for establishing a nuclear weapons free zone in the Middle East, even criticizing United States approach towards nuclear armed Israel. https://www.cndpindia.org/a-nuclear-weapons-free-zone-in-the-middle-east-the-elephant-in-the-room/ https://www.cndpindia.org/a-nuclear-weapons-free-zone-in-the... "Dr M.V. Ramana, Professor and Simons Chair in Disarmament, Global and Human Security at the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs (SPPGA), University of British Columbia, Vancouver, told IPS establishing a nuclear weapons free zone in the Middle East is not only a major challenge but it is also important. The challenge is primarily due to Israel’s refusal to not just discuss its decades-old nuclear weapons program but even acknowledge it, while at the same time attacking countries like Iran over even its nuclear energy-related programs, he argued. Being backed by the United States, which adopts one rule for Israel and another rule for other countries, it is very difficult to involve Israel, said Dr Ramana, who is also Director of the Liu Institute for Global Issues and the Acting Director of the Centre for India and South Asia Research (CISAR) in the Institute of Asian Research."

jl6 24d ago

Feels like there is a "too small" range where fixed costs make a reactor design uneconomic, and perhaps a "too big" range where they cost so much that they are rare strategic investments without the benefit of a production line. Is there a happy medium? Some of the modern SMR proposals aren't all that small. There's a 470MW Rolls Royce unit, for example.

fuoqi 24d ago
The existing "big" nuclear reactors are already more or less in the "happy" range. The problem is irregular building schedule (you can have 10 reactors in works today and 0 for the next 50 years) and extreme regulatory overhead. Ideally, you need a "pipeline" with one reactor being built every 2-5 years and streamlined regulatory environment where you can use the same project "template" with minimal adjustments. This way building expertise is not lost (i.e. the industry does not need to re-learn everything for every project, which is very costly) and even can be accumulated to reduce costs further. It applies not only to the building part, but also to regulatory bodies. The problem is that you need to operate ~100 reactors for this, so it can work only for large economies able to provide the "baseline" demand. China and to a lesser extent Russia do this, which does result in significantly lower nuclear plant building costs for them. Europe, SK, and US have dropped the ball hard here.
- jl6 24d ago
  I think “medium” is a key enabler for being able to sustain a regular schedule of reactor building. It’s way easier to raise $3bn every 3 years than $30bn every 30 years.

pidgeon_lover 24d ago

Nuclear's great until you have a natural disaster or war. Then every single reactor is a potential Chernobyl. The less of those around, the better.

0bytes 24d ago
And the waste, and the environmental impact on fuel mining, and the deconstruction, and the inherent risks, but otherwise yes, it’s great!
harrouet 24d ago
This is absolutely not true. Actually, nuclear is safer than, say, hydraulic power. With that said, it requires a country with good governance and an independent safety regulator (like in France).
bell-cot 24d ago
Nuclear power, as actually implemented in most human societies, is obviously not so great. If it was, we'd have far more of it. And while the combination of natural disasters & war with nuclear power is great for pushing people's emotional buttons, the reality isn't particularly bad. What % of the casualties from the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami were related to the Fukushima plant? What % of the casualties in the Ukraine war have been related to the nuclear plants there? Yes, Putin can talk big about doing all sorts of creepy-scary things related to those nuclear plants. Especially if his doing so gets the sorts of reactions that he wants. But Putin can also talk big about using nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons in Ukraine. Or just order the destruction of a hydroelectric dam - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kakhovka_Dam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kakhovka_Dam - which caused plenty of death and destruction.
leonidasrup 23d ago
Current operating reactors don't have the design, constructions and operational flaws of Chernobyl. Current reactors don't have large positive void coefficient, instabilities at low power levels, manual controlling, slow control rods movements, computers from the 1960s. Your mobile phone can do more computation in a milisecond that Chernobyl could do in minutes. " SKALA (Russian: СКАЛА, система контроля аппарата Ленинградской Атомной; sistema kontrolya apparata Leningradskoj Atomnoj, "Control system of the device of the Leningrad Nuclear [Power Plant]", lit. "rock") was the process computer for the RBMK nuclear reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant prior to October 1995. Dating to the 1960s, it used magnetic-core memory, magnetic tape data storage, and punched tape for loading software. SKALA monitored and recorded reactor conditions and control board inputs. It was wired to accept 7200 analog signals and 6500 digital signals. The system continuously monitored the plant and displayed this information to operators. Additionally, a program called PRIZMA (Russian: ПРИЗМА, программа измерения мощности аппарата; programma izmereniya moshchnosti apparata, "Device power measurement program", lit. "prism") processed plant conditions and made recommendations to guide plant operators. This program took 5 to 10 minutes to run, and could not directly control the reactor" " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_Nuclear_Power_Plant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_Nuclear_Power_Plant As a side note, there are currently still 7 RBMK reactors in operation, in Russia. But they use modern computers, modern instrumentation and control, different composition of nuclear fuel.

harrouet 24d ago

I always get touchy when someone compares the cost of nuclear MWh to the ones of solar and wind turbines, because they are essentially NOT the same MWh. Nuclear works 24x7 on its own. Intermittent energies don't. Intermittent energies need a whole infrastructure on their side (usually gas / coal power plants) to guarantee 24x7 electricity. This cost should be factored in. If you are not convinced, think about your cell phone service: would you pay the same for a network that works only when it is sunny ? No. Not the same. NB: don't even mention batteries, when the largest scale projects, very expensive, can only supply power for a few minutes at grid scale.

derriz 24d ago
Nuclear is also intermittent - ask Europeans. During January this year, nuclear contributed about 62TWh of the electricity generated in the EU while in June this had fallen to 43.7TWh - about a 30% decrease. The deficit was largely filled by a surge of solar generation as well as burning more gas. The drop was due to both scheduled and unscheduled downtime. There is no such thing as a non-intermittent source - even without unscheduled outages, a typical nuclear plant spends over 4 weeks offline a year. You need to be able to handle that also - i.e. with redundancy and backup. Also because nuclear (like coal - the other thermal steam generation tech) requires huge scale to be profitable, it requires huge transmission investment. Contrast this with solar, for example, which is economic to scale down and can deployed in a more distributed pattern.
- harrouet 24d ago
  First, overall consumption is smaller in June than in January, when days are shorter and heating is on. So I don't see how comparing these 2 numbers makes a relevant argument. Second, you can't compare technical (planned) maintenance with the uncontrolled intermittence of wind or solar. Not having sun or wind during peak demand is the actual problem. In Europe, peak demand is 6-8pm in winter: no sun, no wind. The last problematic preventive maintenance, mandated by the supervising agency, which forced France to import MWh for a few months was in 2022. Anything human-made can have a downtime. It was actually a voluntary (although mandated) downtime in this case. Moreover, you may not know that nuclear is forced to reduce output when intermittent energies increase their output. There is no good technical reason for this, it is just how the regulation has been made (you can imagine lobbying entities asking for it). You may have noticed more sun in June than in January, so yes nuclear may have had to reduce output. Not due to the technology.