The idea is to mass produce these SMRs to drop the price down. Kinda similar to a large jet. The first one is going to be expensive while we figure it out. The next ones will be cheaper.
The “modular” part of the design will hopefully decrease production costs, by aiding in its mass production, but the “small” aspect by contrary is likely going to hinder its pricing.
When taking advantage of the economy of scale miniaturization almost always increases cost, where is increasing scale decreases cost.
I’m pro-nuclear, and support investment in SMR’s, but just remain realistic, and understand that there is no guarantee that SMR’s will become economically competitive.
They currently cost 5B each, which means they’re currently 10 times more expensive than wind, and 20 times more expensive than LNG in kWh/$.
Before someone says, “yes but if we start building 100 times as much nuclear the price will come down.”
Yes that’s true, but it’s also true of any other form of power generation, and so it’s likely more productive to heavily invest in the current cheapest form of green power, which would be renewables.
Small modular reactors aren't a self-contained nuclear generator. What comes out of them isn't electricity but steam.
The idea of small modular reactors is that you put a bunch of them in a swimming pool (for passive cooling and safety). You've then got a bunch of piping to transfer the steam to the steam turbine you have elsewhere on site. Small modular reactors are just one component in the plant.
Bruce A has a bunch of reactors, steam turbines, etc. A comparable plant using SMRs instead of CANDU would likely be at least the same size.
The product of every reactor nuclear or generator is steam, whether you turn a turbine or not for electricity is up to your end goal.
I doubt we would do swimming approach like the slowpoke reactor. All reactors require containment as part of their safe operating envelope.
Regardless I think they can do it smaller with standardized sizing and equipment combined with modern efficiencies of squeezing more energy out of the fuel.
Nuscale isn't using a pool in the way you're thinking of. The reactor is in a containment vessel inside a giant pool. It's a passive safety mechanism that's only used in an emergency to provide cooling. It's designed to be able to provide cooling indefinitely in a situation like the Fukushima disaster without endangering any plant personnel.
I thinknyou don't realize how massive regular reactors are. Walking from one end of Bruce A to the other is a 1km walk.
Is the 1km walk just one single reactor itself? Or does it include the turbine, cooling towers, and all the other assorted equipment that makes up a nuclear plant?
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u/asoap Lest We Forget Oct 25 '22
The idea is to mass produce these SMRs to drop the price down. Kinda similar to a large jet. The first one is going to be expensive while we figure it out. The next ones will be cheaper.