I guess the point is that they’re working on better batteries, right? Ones that can get better efficiencies and all that? I am not an expert in this area of course, but I’m also not able to build you an SMR, so again, idk what technology will eventually win out (in terms of cost effectiveness or overall viability) I just know it’s something everyone’s talking about.
There’s a great story from the Fukushima response that is basically this exact thing. Plant operator (I think it was…) got told by some bigwig not to put seawater in the ractor because it would scuttle the reactor and it could never be used again. Guy ordered it done anyway because they didn’t have fresh water and the reactor needed water over it to prevent total meltdown.
You hit the nail on the head, my friend. I’m always telling the people I work with that part of our job is to verify what the utility says they are doing. Not because we don’t trust the people we work with, but because we can’t trust their bosses.
Also, I’m going to check out the video you mentioned, but as someone who has been in several plants… Yes, they really care about safety. To an almost annoying degree. Like, even in the hallways you’re not supposed to walk and look at your phone screen because it’s a safety hazard. Which, sure, but it’s an office and I have emails to read, you know?
I’m glad someone brought up the land use issue. A nuclear power plant is a pretty compact thing, for the amount of power it’s creating.
I think that’s a somewhat narrow view on how energy works.
Part of the cost of nuclear is all the lawsuits. Someone else talked about China doing a lot with nuclear and part of that is that they don’t have to deal with the lawsuits. So so so many lawsuits.
I do love this chart though. It’s really representative of why we need to invest in new technology even when it seems stupid expensive at first.
The 2 points I do want to bring up are, one, as someone else mentioned, battery storage. It’s sort of the unsolved puzzle of renewables at this point. I’m certain we will figure it out and be able to produce something at scale and renewables at that point will be the only even sort of ethical option (assuming the batteries aren’t made of minerals mined exclusively by slave labor or something, then I guess the debate will still rage on).
And second, SMRs are still not actually a thing yet. The cost of nuclear could drop (probably will drop drastically) when mini nuclear power plants are being produced rapidly and shipped around to various locations. Kinda like how building a modular home is much cheaper than a fully custom one with a bespoke design. Assuming they find a way to make all that happen before widespread large load batteries, I wouldn’t consider it as clear cut.
In fairness, it’s not one engineer. It’s literally hundreds of them. Thousands, probably. And not all of them working for a common goal. The power of the NRC is in its desire to slow down and double check (which is why the drump administration’s push for deregulation is scary for nuclear).
I’m not saying mistakes don’t happen, but the Russians knew Chernobyl was flawed they just didn’t care.
I don’t think OP was saying we should store it that way, just that it’s not as physically as big a problem as people imagine. It’s a question of scale.
We could just leave them all in the storage containers that the plants use and put them in one place and the overall facility wouldn’t be that big.
As for groundwater contamination, you are right. No leaks allowed. This is a consideration for any waste management really (superfund sites, anyone?). Transportation is another issue for consideration. If you move the waste on a roadway, and there’s an accident, you’re going to have to clean up the mess (assuming there is any. We have really amazing containers for shipping) or at least check for any issues, which means every fire department with a major roadway needs to both be trained and have the equipment to handle a radioactive car crash.
It is confusing! I’ll add my understanding and it will probably be different than other things you’ve heard, but I’ll add it anyway.
The NRC (for the US) is the regulator. They have ultimate authority to inspect all nuclear power plants. Sometimes the state does as well, depends on the state’s agreement with the NRC. But ultimately it’s the NRC. Every power plant has an NRC inspector whose job it is to look for infractions and make sure the plant is doing all the things. They obviously can’t be everywhere at once, so there’s a bunch of other stuff the plants have to do to prove they are following all the rules. There is currently a huge regulatory burden on nuclear power plant operators and owners. Good. It should be that way for small modular reactors but it remains to be seen of they’ll be able to get away with less safe practices (my bet is yes, at least under the current administration).
Waste is complicated. The US government made a deal a long time ago with the utilities building the plants that they’d provide a place for waste storage, and they haven’t, so they’ve been sued. They’ll just keep getting sued and have to pay the utilities back (the utilities pay for the waste location by paying the gov… It’s weird). There are some attempts being made to have a private company (or companies) take over storing the waste. It’s complicated, and still requires us to transport the waste, which is also complicated. That being said, the DOE has been doing transuranic waste transportation for ages (irradiated junk in barrels) It’s called WIPP and they move all the contaminated crap to a salt mine in NV. It’s not easy, but it can be done.
As for loosing any of the waste… Yeah, if you lose the actual waste that’s very bad and NRC very mad at you. But the irradiated junk? Eh, the government loses shit all the time. Irradiated junk isn’t great, but it’s probably not killing you. Probably not.
And as for who’s profiting? Who knows? It’s like George Carlin said. It’s a big club and you ain’t in it.
Give it time. Maybe one day we’ll be able to buy a kit. (For internet purposes, this is a j o k e)
To be fair, there’s waste issues with end of life for solar and wind too. No matter what solution we go with, we need a way to deal with the waste (recycling is probably the best option, but storage for nuclear waste doesn’t actually take up that much space. For solar/wind, it’s going to have to be recycling or a huge ass landfill).
It’s safer than living next to a coal fired power plant!
By a very very large magnitude. And when you factor in stuff like mining deaths and industrial accidents, nuclear kills less people than wind (per kwh) but solar is slightly better than nuclear.
This is absolutely my main concern too (and the specific area in which I work, so the thing I feel lost comfortable commenting on). I don’t think it’s going to be an overnight shift or anything. What I think will happen is that the US will step away from standard international practices when it comes to how much radiation a person can receive (and therefore how much the general public can receive) and while nothing will change right away, eventually nuclear plants will cut costs somewhere and not filter out as much material as they have been required to up til now. Any increases in cancer 20-30 years from now will probably get blamed on something else though, knowing how our system works. For nuclear workers, the effects will probably be more noticable and quicker, but again, attempts will be made to hide any negative health consequences. Lord forbid we have a release incident during that time though. And even worse if regulations relax to the point where the utility doesn’t have to carry the burden of fixing the problem they created (which is where I see things going over the long term). Right now, if a plant releases radioactive material they are legal responsible for that material. If that eroded what incentive will they have to make sure they don’t lose it?
This isn’t my exact area, but my understanding is that this is also a political will thing. There are concerns about reprocessing because some of the reprocessing could make bombs and we’re scared of it getting stolen? I think? Idk, not my area. But as I understand it, other places in the world already do reprocessing. I’m not sure we will ever get there. We can’t even get a storage facility!
It’s not about energy density. It’s about base load issues. One of the big items that the nuclear industry harps on is that they handle base load energy requirements when wind and solar aren’t producing as much. But a good battery system would also solve that problem, by allowing excess wind and solar energy to be stored for use when the base load is high but wind and solar aren’t able to produce that amount of energy at that exact time.
I don’t know anything about the ones in France, but it’s worth noting that the second biggest nuclear power plant in the US is in Phoenix. They work in the heat, you just have to be prepared for that.
Idk who thought it was a good idea to put a nuclear power plant, which needs water both for cooling and for steam generation, in the middle of a desert, but there totally is one. It uses wastewater from Phoenix for both and has to remove radionuclides twice (going in, it’s from people’s pee!)
I’m nuclear industry adjacent, and I work in public safety. My thoughts, which are only my own:
It would have to be a pretty big bomb. After 9/11 they did a bunch of research and it turns out a reactor building can take a hit from a 747.
Renewables are absolutely the future, but people really don’t get how the nuclear industry handles safety. If we could regulate every industry as well as the nuclear industry has been since 1980 (which the current administration is trying to strip away, of course) we would eliminate a heckuva lotta risk in our society.
Cost effectiveness isn’t the only consideration. My area isn’t how they move the power around but I know that plays a role too.