A large number of startups have proposed conceptions that should be much less prone to failure. Many of them are SMRs, or small modular reactors, which promise to save scale by building the reactor in a central installation, then sending it to the installation site. But, for the moment, only one reactor of this type has been approved in the United States, and the only planned installation of this design was canceled As the expected cost of its electricity becomes non -competitive.
This environment makes investment in nuclear energy extremely risky in itself. However, we are also at a time when the prices of natural gas, wind and in particular solar energy are incredibly low, which makes it difficult to justify the initial costs of nuclear energy, as well as the long delay before starting to generate yields on these costs.
A new hope?
This is the situation that the Trump administration hopes to change, although you can question the sincerity of this effort. To start, the decrees were issued on Friday before a vacation weekend, usually the time reserved for news to which you hope that no one will pay attention. One of the announcements also refers to nuclear energy as a distributable (which means that it can be increased quickly from top to bottom), which is certainly not. Finally, it praises nuclear energy as avoiding the risks associated with other forms of power, “like pollution with potentially deleterious health effects”. Elsewhere, however, the administration eliminates pollution regulations and promotes the use of high pollution fuels, such as coal.
Overall, the actions proposed in new decrees vary from fantasy to potentially reasonable. For example, the “Invigorate the nuclear industrial base“Order requires the development of the capacity to retreat the nuclear fuel spent to obtain useful fuel, an extremely expensive process compared to the exploitation of new fuels, and would only make nuclear energy less viable economically. It also requires recommendations concerning the permanent storage of any remaining waste, a problem which has remained unresolved for decades.
