News & Articles on Nuclear Power
Nuclear is not renewable, but it’s listed here for organizational reasons. I wasn’t really interested in nuclear, didn’t think it had any future, and that it was effectively dead. I wasn’t writing about it. However, like a vampire, nuclear kept rising from the grave and stalking the land. Talk continued of reviving it one more time. This talk had a real effect on public policy in North America, especially in Ontario, Canada. Thus, I felt it necessary to include nuclear topics and this was the place on my web site where it was easiest to insert
What Drives This Madness On Small Modular Nuclear Reactors?
By
Michael Barnard
This week I had an equivalent question from someone engaged by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. The individual isn’t an industry insider and didn’t have a particular iron in the fire, but had been engaged to write a Bulletin piece on the perplexing enthusiasm small modular nuclear reactors (SMR) are seeing from an overlapping circle of advocates and firms. This was, of course, in the week when NuScale inevitably imploded, a story I’ll return to as I unpack some of the motivations behind those thinking a bunch of lab technologies that have been around for decades that depend on uranium from Russia, that don’t have the physical characteristics for cheap nuclear generation and don’t have the conditions for success for nuclear generation will be the saviours of the nuclear industry and a key wedge in fighting climate change.
UK Has £10 Billion Per Nuclear Reactor Decommissioning Bottomless Pit
By
Michael Barnard
The decommissioning costs for the UK’s nuclear generation are coming home to roost, and they are laying golden eggs for the firms that won the business. For UK citizens, not so much. Despite the very high costs of both the new nuclear reactors at Hinkley Site C, the rapidly rising costs of clean up and the much cheaper alternatives available, the country’s current administration remains committed to the technology. Something is likely to give. If there were no alternatives to nuclear generation, then this wouldn’t be a problem compared to global warming. But, of course, this is 2023 and there are proven, effective, efficient and reliable forms of low-carbon electrical generation that do compete with nuclear energy, wind and solar.
Adventures In Failed Technology: Small Modular Reactors & Hydrogen Buses
By
Michael Barnard
Small modular nuclear reactor and hydrogen for energy proposals and trials are all zombie proposals sucking time, effort, and willpower away from the necessary decarbonization of our economy. This little roundup is just an appetizer course for the absurd feast of riches to come with canceled projects and crashing dreams.
Does California really need 5 more years of Diablo Canyon’s ‘reliable energy’?
By
David Weisman
Ultimately, California will have to determine whether another five years of Diablo Canyon operations is a cost-effective solution to evolving reliability needs. The plant isn’t nimble enough to respond to the rapid ramping up and down requirements caused by the massive growth in solar generation. Like a light switch, it’s either on or off. And it’s designed to operate 90% of the time — 7,884 hours a year.
What was the French-German spat on energy really about?
By
Jérôme Guillet
The French nuclear programme was a great success, but the conditions to replicate it are gone, and there will be no new nuclear plants built because they cannot be financed, and there are cheaper alternatives (and baseload is not adapted to our new system).
The first US nuclear reactor built from scratch in decades enters commercial operation in Georgia
By
External Source
Georgia Power Co. announced Monday that Unit 3 at Plant Vogtle, southeast of Augusta, has completed testing and is now in commercial operation, seven years late and $17 billion over budget.
Ontario opts for high-risk nuclear over low-risk energy sources
By
Mark Winfield
n fact, the announcements by the Ford government of 4800MW in new build nuclear projects at the Bruce Nuclear site near Tiverton, and three additional new reactors at the Darlington site east of Toronto, committed Ontario to one of the largest nuclear construction programs in the world.
Jérôme Guillet on Substack
By
Jérôme Guillet
Insightful analysis by an authority on wind energy and energy policy with extensive experience in the offshore wind sector.
The duck in the room – the end of baseload
By
Jérôme Guillet
There’s simply no space left for new (or even, soon, old) nuclear
The revolving door at public utilities commissions? It’s alive and well
By
External Source
Of the 473 commissioners for whom Heern could find information on what they did after they left utility regulation, 50% of them went to work for one of the industries they regulated, or in an industry-adjacent role such as consulting. “That revolving door is definitely alive and well,” Heern told me.
