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Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
Earlier this year, the US took a major step that could potentially change the economics of nuclear power: it approved a design for a small, modular nuclear reactor from a company called NuScale. These small reactors are intended to overcome the economic problems that have ground the construction of large nuclear plants to a near halt. While each only produces a fraction of the power possible with a large plant, the modular design allows for mass production and a design that requires less external safety support.
But safety approval is just an early step in the process of building a plant. And the leading proposal for the first NuScale plant is running into the same problem as traditional designs: finances.
The proposal, called the Carbon Free Power Project, would be a cluster of a dozen NuScale reactors based at Idaho National Lab but run by Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems, or UAMPS. With all 12 operating, the plant would produce 720 MW of power. But UAMPS is selling it as a way to offer the flexibility needed to complement variable renewable power. Typically, a nuclear plant is either producing or not, but the modular design allows the Carbon Free Power Project to shut individual reactors off if demand is low.
But keeping a plant idle means you're not selling any power from it, making it more difficult to pay off the initial investment made to produce it and adding to the financial risks. Further increasing risk is the fact that this is the first project of its kind—the NuScale website lists it as "NuScale's First Plant." All of this appears to be making things complicated for the Carbon Free Power Project.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 09 2020, @08:52AM (4 children)
It's not optimal to run nuclear at small scale. You lose all the power to heat. Might as well use it for district heating - oh wait, US has little of that (only things like hospitals or university campuses). These things are probably only useful in places like China or Europe or even Russia where you have district heating.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Monday November 09 2020, @11:06AM (1 child)
I don't see why. 60 MW output per turbine is on the low side compared to e.g. coal or gas but not totally outrageous.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Monday November 09 2020, @11:13AM
Here is a nice article with more info:
https://www.thermal-engineering.org/what-is-thermal-efficiency-of-steam-turbine-definition/ [thermal-engineering.org]
(Score: 2) by dak664 on Monday November 09 2020, @01:17PM
Yes, 60MW(e) likely needs to exaust >100MW(t). That number goes up rapidly with exit steam enthalpy, so cooling towers are often used to get a couple percent increase in efficiency. Most states classify tower cooling as consumptive use of water, while river cooling is considered non-consumptive. In many (most?) places there is little water that can be allocated to new industries.
So I would consider these as low-temperature process heat providers, with the electricial output as a bonus.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by khallow on Monday November 09 2020, @01:19PM
While I agree (it's much easier to maintain a higher temperature gradient in a larger reactor), something doesn't need to be optimal at generating electricity in order to be good enough (or to be more optimal in ways that matter more).
One of the big problems with nuclear reactors is that you need to load at once the fuel for generating power for months or years. That in turn generates the scary problems that so much of nuclear power plant regulation is intended to mitigate or prevent. A smaller reactor has much less potential for mischief (and generation of liability) than a big one has.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by oumuamua on Monday November 09 2020, @02:52PM
When you drop the ball, someone else is going to run with it.
China has generation IV prototypes already built and full scale reactors coming online soon, across several design variations.
https://www.globalconstructionreview.com/news/china-starts-work-landmark-fourth-generation-fast-/ [globalconstructionreview.com]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_China#Generation_IV_reactors [wikipedia.org]
Also using nuclear for district heating:
https://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1170222.shtml [globaltimes.cn]
(Score: 2) by anotherblackhat on Monday November 09 2020, @11:38PM (1 child)
Figuring a 20 year amortization, every $1/watt increases of up front cost, increases the cost of the electricity by little over half a cent per kWh.
NuScale's modular reactor is projected to cost 3 billion for a 684mWe generator -- so that means 2.2 cents per kWh on top of all the other costs (and that's assuming there are no cost over runs)
When you add the cost maintaining, running and fueling the reactor, it's not cheaper than natural gas, or coal, and only barely cheaper than burning oil.
We don't need a SMR (small modular reactor). We need an CR (cheap reactor).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 10 2020, @12:10AM
Nuclear is necessary to provide clean energy while "green" sources are not producing, so why not try to solve the problem economically?
State or federal government could take control of energy production, they already fund much of the construction, maintenance and workers aren't huge extra expenditures. - Impossible in America. The MIC and big energy are joined at the hip and incredibly powerful
Pass laws making energy companies legally and financially liable for failures to reliably deliver power, while also decommissioning fossil fuel plants and offering incentives to build nuclear. - It would amount to bribing energy companies with billions of dollars worth of taxpayer cash, but it would probably work if these companies don't borrow experts from the telcos (experts at taking the money and never delivering).