NuScale has filed a design certification application with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on a revolutionary design for a small, modular nuclear reactor:
Nearly a decade after setting up shop to commercialize technology developed at Oregon State University, NuScale Power has become the first company to submit a design certification application for a small modular reactor (SMR) to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
The company, a Fluor Corp. subsidiary which is headquartered in Portland and employs about hundreds of people in Corvallis, filed the application on Thursday and announced the milestone during a press conference in Washington, D.C.
John Hopkins, a former Fluor executive who championed the heavy construction company’s investment in the next-generation nuclear technology before becoming NuScale’s CEO in late 2012, called SMRs the future of the nuclear power industry.
“I believed then, as I believe now, that the NuScale small modular reactor is a disruptive technology with the potential to change the world,†he said.
I believe I’ve written about this company in the past. To understand just how revolutionary the design is, they’re talking about nuclear reactors that are a tiny fraction of the size of today’s reactors:
NuScale’s design is a departure from traditional nuclear power plants, enormous facilities that typically generate about 1,000 megawatts of electricity. By contrast, a NuScale power module is designed to generate 50 megawatts.
Each self-contained reactor vessel could be built in a factory and shipped by truck, train or barge to its destination. As many as 12 modules could be installed in a single power plant to provide a total output of up to 600 megawatts.
That’s a real game-changer in any number of ways, not the least of which is the power distribution model. There’s a real difference between a nuclear reactor that serves a city and one that serves a neighborhood, especially in terms of continuity and reliability.
Also, if you’re skeptical about nuclear power because it always turns out to be more expensive than projections, consider this:
More than 800 NuScale employees and contract workers were involved in developing the 12,000-page application, which took eight and a half years of design, engineering and testing to produce at a cost of $500 million, according to Mike McGough, the company’s chief commercialization officer.
A lot of the expense doesn’t consist of technical bottlenecks but in regulatory and legal ones.
This just intuitively sounds tremendous. I’ll have to read the article, but do they address the SH (shit happens) factor. More reactors means more chances for an aw-shit moment.
“I thought you turned on the cooling water…” 😮
Unfortunately design, engineering and even regulations probably can’t compete with know-nothing NIMBYism for this technology. It will be a huge uphill battle.
A lot of the expense doesn’t consist of technical bottlenecks but in regulatory and legal ones
We should definitely get rid of those expensive regulations. If there are problems, the cancerous, mutated survivors can just sue the plants owners.
From the article: Much smaller and simpler than traditional nukes, NuScale SMRs use natural convection currents to circulate cooling water within the reactor vessel. With no complicated electrical pumps to fail in an operating accident or natural disaster, the company claims its reactors will automatically turn themselves off in a shutdown and allow the core to cool naturally with no human intervention
If this is a practical pebble reactor, it should be a lot safer, which is a very good thing. (The article also mentions financial fraud involving the company, so I am extra skeptical)
Also, pebble reactors don’t require a lot of the mixed use technologies that can benefit nuclear weapons programs, so popularizing them may help curb nuclear proliferation.