NEI Nuclear Notes

This morning Paul Genoa, NEI’s senior director of policy development, completed a tour of 10 radio outlets – including three state networks covering Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee – discussing small reactor technology in the context of the administration’s release of the FY 14 budget tomorrow. The president has supported SMR technology in his budgets each of the past three years. Paul characterized SMRs as an “elegant evolution” relative to large light water reactor technology, one whose development over the next decade will “kickstart an entire industry.” You'd be right in believing that today in industry there is a good deal of excitement about the frontier of SMR technology, and for good reason. B&W's mPower SMR. The four current SMR designs, Paul told his radio audiences, possess “an economy of scaleability,” affording them the versatility to respond to load growth, and are likely to be situated on sites of about 30 acres, or “the size of a relatively small sh...

Last Wednesday, CSIS hosted Scaling Down Reactors: A Different Model for Nuclear Energy , and has made available the speaker bios and presentations along with audio of the event. Their brief overview of this new & growing field: Several companies and research teams are now pioneering smaller reactor designs that could present a unique set of characteristics and benefits desirable to domestic utilities as well as other nations interested in nuclear energy. Ranging in size and technology, smaller reactors could offer different capital cost structures, the possibility of modular designs, and new operational and safety characteristics. Internationally, these reactors may also introduce important considerations for grid compatibility and nonproliferation efforts. Then, NRC hel d a workshop Thursday and Friday, Small- and Medium-Sized Reactors , at which Chairman Greg Jaczko spoke . The presenters’ slides are here , except for DOE’s presentation . NEI was represented by Paul Genoa, wh...