Do you have any opinions on light water SMR designs? Do you think the idea to mass produce them and distribute these smaller reactors on a local basis is feasible, or do you think if they are mass produced we would be more likely to see them clustered in series in more modern plants?
Idk much about that in particular but I can speculate based on what I know about the power industry and business in general. I think larger modular clusters (10-30) would be more common just because of the infrastructure needed. Sure, we might see instances of 1-3 units here and there, but I imagine that if a company is already going to the trouble of buying a plot of land and building a switchyard, getting water access and RO-EDI tech for it, cooling water of whatever type, n+1 redundancy on all equipment, radioactive waste management including on-site storage of spent fuel, etc while also welcoming the NRC and FERC and whoever else to scrutinize, it makes the most sense to have several units making money power. Like anything else, upping the scale makes the cost per instance go down. Nuclear in the US has a fuckload of red tape and permitting and oversight that cost a lot of money to stay on top of. There could be good applications for small clusters like closer to urban, more densely populated areas where land is expensive and the power needs are the immediate vicinity. Or in developing areas that don’t have much power demand, at least not yet. There’s no good reason why a small cluster couldn’t replace the remaining coal plants. It’s also completely feasible to throw some up at military bases or large university campuses for training and their own power needs. Big power will want to squeeze as many into as small of a space with as little maintenance requirement as they can get away with because everything they do is in the name of maximizing profits for shareholders. But for nationalized power like in France, it kinda doesn’t make sense to build anything else right now.
Maybe the best part of SMR tech as I understand it is that somebody could get the land and permits and infrastructure set up for the end goal but just build a small percentage of the reactors at first, and then scale up later. This is cheaper to start, faster to build, and is a perfect proof of concept strategy to get investors excited at funding the bulk of the project.
Do you have any opinions on light water SMR designs? Do you think the idea to mass produce them and distribute these smaller reactors on a local basis is feasible, or do you think if they are mass produced we would be more likely to see them clustered in series in more modern plants?
Idk much about that in particular but I can speculate based on what I know about the power industry and business in general. I think larger modular clusters (10-30) would be more common just because of the infrastructure needed. Sure, we might see instances of 1-3 units here and there, but I imagine that if a company is already going to the trouble of buying a plot of land and building a switchyard, getting water access and RO-EDI tech for it, cooling water of whatever type, n+1 redundancy on all equipment, radioactive waste management including on-site storage of spent fuel, etc while also welcoming the NRC and FERC and whoever else to scrutinize, it makes the most sense to have several units making
moneypower. Like anything else, upping the scale makes the cost per instance go down. Nuclear in the US has a fuckload of red tape and permitting and oversight that cost a lot of money to stay on top of. There could be good applications for small clusters like closer to urban, more densely populated areas where land is expensive and the power needs are the immediate vicinity. Or in developing areas that don’t have much power demand, at least not yet. There’s no good reason why a small cluster couldn’t replace the remaining coal plants. It’s also completely feasible to throw some up at military bases or large university campuses for training and their own power needs. Big power will want to squeeze as many into as small of a space with as little maintenance requirement as they can get away with because everything they do is in the name of maximizing profits for shareholders. But for nationalized power like in France, it kinda doesn’t make sense to build anything else right now.Maybe the best part of SMR tech as I understand it is that somebody could get the land and permits and infrastructure set up for the end goal but just build a small percentage of the reactors at first, and then scale up later. This is cheaper to start, faster to build, and is a perfect proof of concept strategy to get investors excited at funding the bulk of the project.
Thanks for your insight