Off the Siberian coast, not far from Alaska, a Russian ship has been docked at port for four years. The Akademik Lomonosov, the world’s first floating nuclear power plant, sends energy to around 200,000 people on land using next-wave nuclear technology: small modular reactors.
This technology is also being used below sea level. Dozens of US submarines lurking in the depths of the world’s oceans are propelled by SMRs, as the compact reactors are known.
SMRs — which are smaller and less costly to build than traditional, large-scale reactors — are fast becoming the next great hope for a nuclear renaissance as the world scrambles to cut fossil fuels. And the US, Russia and China are battling for dominance to build and sell them.
SMRs are interesting.
Frankly i just think we need to take SMR tech and scale it up to stationary plant size. I realize thats a big ask, but it’s already a big enough ask to make SMRs a thing that exist and work. Plus a whole plant is more inline with existing regulations.
Also worst case scenario, it’s just normal nuclear plants. Instead of a bunch of small ones. We have a bunch of big ones, but with standardized designs.
Big Bespoke Reactors? Isn’t that what we do now?
I thought the entire advantage was to be small and use multiple.
- Construction is cheaper because you can gear up a factory to make many of the same thing
- Assembly is cheaper and more reliable because you have more complete modules shipped in for less site assembly
- Sizing is cheaper because instead of designing for the specific site and specific needs, design for how many standard modules you want
- Enhancing is cheaper because a smaller unit is easier to fit into whatever situation you have than to redesign the whole thing
- Maintenance is cheaper because taking one offline is less of a hit in total power generation
