A new report has assessed the feasibility of deploying small modular nuclear reactors to meet increasing energy demands around the world. The findings don't look so good for this particular form of energy production.

[T]he report’s executive summary certainly gets to the heart of their findings.

“The rhetoric from small modular reactor (SMR) advocates is loud and persistent: This time will be different because the cost overruns and schedule delays that have plagued large reactor construction projects will not be repeated with the new designs,” says the report. “But the few SMRs that have been built (or have been started) paint a different picture – one that looks startlingly similar to the past. Significant construction delays are still the norm and costs have continued to climb.”

  • @BookmeatEnglish
    -4•6 months ago

    It’s not because of smr, it’s just that all large projects have this level of corruption and grift.

    • @[email protected]English
      10•6 months ago

      all large projects have this level of corruption and grift

      Skill issue. I can’t even blame capitalism, since the french manage to get almost 90% of their power from nuclear.

      China has 53 GW installed, 25 GW under construction, and another 47 GW planned. Generally they’re pretty clear-eyed when it comes to major projects like this, so I think we can infer the availability of cheap hydro and solar doesn’t favor doing more than ~15% nuclear since they’re only planning to increase it by 150% over the next couple decades.

      Maybe that will change when they set up long term storage/reprocessing.

      • @[email protected]English
        12•6 months ago

        IIRC the French reactors are all nearing their end of service life and’ll be decommissioned soon.

      • @vzqEnglish
        3•6 months ago

        Surely you made a typo? 50 MW is a tenth of the electrical yield of the smallest PWR you can profitably operate.