What the US needs for future nuclear power tech to get off the ground

"The race against climate change is both a marathon and a sprint," declares a new report from the US National Academies of Science. While we need to start decarbonizing immediately with the tech we have now—the sprint—the process will go on for decades, during which technology that's still in development could potentially play a critical role.

The technology at issue in the report is a new generation of nuclear reactors based on different technology; they're smaller and easier to build, and they could potentially use different coolants. The next generation of designs is working to avoid the delays and cost overruns that are crippling attempts to build additional reactors both here and overseas. But their performance in the real world will remain an unknown until next decade at the earliest, placing them squarely in the "marathon" portion of the race.

The new report focuses on what the US should do to ensure that the new generation of designs has a chance to be evaluated on its merits.

The next generation

Most of the next generation of nuclear power designs fall into the category of what are termed small modular reactors (SMRs). These designs have two emphases: They are modular and could potentially be mass-produced, and they focus on inherent safety.

Combined, these factors will theoretically allow for rapid and cheap production of reactors and a far lower footprint for the supporting power plant where the reactors are installed.

Many of them generate power by boiling water. But some use more unusual coolants, such as gas, molten salt, or liquid sodium. Every one of them, however, shares a critical feature: They haven't been built. All the expectations we might have about their costs, electricity production, and so forth are estimates. The only approved small modular design will first be incorporated into a power plant at the end of the decade—if everything goes well. Some other companies plan to be ready to go into production sooner, but their designs aren't yet approved.

While these designs are unlikely to compete on cost with renewables, they have a number of potential uses once the low-hanging fruit of decarbonization has been picked. These include helping with managing the intermittency of renewables, providing heat for hard-to-decarbonize industrial processes, and even desalination or the production of hydrogen (either for direct use or for the production of synthetic fuels).

The report acknowledges that the potential utility of next-generation designs is completely up in the air, noting that it will depend on "the evolution of energy policy, comparative economics with other energy technologies, the challenge of building plants on budget and on schedule, future energy demand and the structure of the grid, societal preferences, and the prospect of using nuclear energy for purposes beyond electricity generation."

But the report's authors write that there's value in maintaining next-generation nuclear as an option since we don't know how any of those factors will evolve over the coming decades.

For everything to work out, there's an equally long list of things that will need to be accomplished. These include "completing demonstrations of new reactor technologies, verifying new business cases (e.g., non-electric applications), showing improved cost metrics that are competitive with other low-carbon power generation technologies, improving construction and project management compared to current LWR builds, obtaining timely regulatory approval, gaining societal acceptance in host communities, and responding to security and safeguard obligations," the report says.

The focus of the report is on how we can create a favorable environment for those things to happen.

Support your local small modular nuclear power plant

So how should we go about ensuring that we fully explore the potential of a next generation of nuclear power plants? A big part of that involves keeping their costs from spiraling out of control, as they have for current plant designs. This is in part because the report recognizes that the plants will be competing against a host of other low-carbon technologies. "Widespread commercial deployment of nuclear reactors will occur only if nuclear power projects can convincingly demonstrate that they can compete in a marketplace with alternatives," the report authors state.

To help keep things competitive, the report calls for the Department of Energy to fund a research program that applies modern materials design for improving the performance of fuels and reactor components. Noting that the growing costs of nuclear power plants have mostly been due to the construction of support and ancillary structures at the plant rather than the reactor itself, the report also calls for the DOE to fund research into how to streamline and reduce the costs of this work.

All of this, the report argues, should be done with the goal of moving technologies quickly toward the maturity needed to build a demonstration plant. "The nuclear industry and the Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy should fully develop a structured, ongoing program to ensure the best-performing technologies move rapidly to and through demonstration," the report suggests. "Concepts that do not meet their milestones in the ordinary course should no longer receive support, and newer concepts should be allowed to enter the program in their place."

Once expertise is developed during that construction, it's essential that it not be lost. The report recommends that potential builders of commercial facilities form a consortium that uses the same firms and personnel on all plants built using similar technology. (In some ways, that's how the fossil fuel drilling process operates.) DOE involvement in the training of engineers and operators for the construction and operation of the facilities is also recommended.

The public/private interface

The Inflation Reduction Act includes some funding to subsidize nuclear power; the report calls for this funding to be extended so it's still in effect when plants based on the next generation of technology are ready to be built. It also calls for the DOE to fund studies about the economics of using these technologies for things like industrial heat and desalination to provide some greater certainty about these new markets. There's also a call for subsidies that would encourage the construction of these facilities overseas, providing additional markets for the companies that build or design them.

While the licensing process overseen by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) should continue to emphasize safety, the report calls for the process to be made flexible enough to accommodate a range of nuclear technologies beyond the boiling water used at present. The NRC will also need new security guidelines to cover the additional use cases mentioned above.

Finally, there's the issue of public support for new nuclear power technology. Maintaining support for construction requires what the report calls a "consent-based approach to siting." Specifically, the report says, "The nuclear industry should follow the best practices, including (1) a participatory process of site selection; (2) the right for communities to veto or opt out (within agreed-upon limits); (3) some form of compensation granted for affected communities; (4) partial funding for affected communities to conduct independent technical analyses; (5) efforts to develop a partnership to pursue the project between the implementer and local community; and (6) an overriding commitment to honesty."

A clear-eyed take

Anyone interested in the potential use of nuclear power to address climate change should read the report. While its authors clearly consider nuclear power a potential solution, they're under no illusions that it's the only or best solution. The report makes it clear that, for economic and technical reasons, nuclear will be sitting out the next decade or so of the energy transition.

And while some newer technologies have the potential to contribute in the decades that follow, they will face an uphill struggle against renewable generation that is currently dramatically lower in price and still dropping. While nuclear can still play a role in deep decarbonization, making it an economically viable option will require strong and consistent support from the government—and that support needs to start nearly immediately.

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