Tag: nuclear reactors

Are pro-nuclear politics a threat to public safety?

The one moribund nuclear power sector is suddenly a hive of activity, and nuclear regulators face pressure to rapidly assess an unprecedented number and variety of projects. How they respond will determine winners and losers among reactor designers, power companies and nations. More importantly, it will shape the future safety of nuclear energy and, if they get it wrong, squander the technology’s recently-revived public support.

Congress created the NRC in 1974 after pro-nuclear bias sunk the Atomic Energy Commission

I evaluated the quandary facing regulators for Nature magazine, drawing lessons from nuclear power’s history and perspective from past and present nuclear regulators around the world.

Front and center is the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which has pivoted aggressively to an unapologetically nuclear-boosting posture under Trump 2.0. NRC chairman Ho Nieh is pushing for rapid transformation to make his agency a nuclear construction enabler. His stated goals: “Licences are issued. Shovels go in the ground. And we start building nuclear reactors safely and securely in the United States.”

Are “shovels in the ground” an appropriate measure of success for a nuclear regulator? Read on for answers…

by pfairley

EC Sees Heavy Pricetag to UK Nukes Plan

UK prime minister David Cameron at Hinkley Point
UK prime minister David Cameron at Hinkley Point

Government incentives for a pair of proposed nuclear reactors could cost U.K. taxpayers as much as £17.62 billion, thus exceeding the reactors’ projected cost. The EC figure is a preliminary estimate included in an initial report to London published on Friday by European Commission competition czars. The letter notifies the British government that—as we predicted in December—Brussels is launching a formal investigation to assess whether the subsidies violate European state aid rules.

The preliminary findings suggest that the U.K. and E.C. are on a collision source. As the Financial Times summed it up this weekend: “The severity of [the EC’s] initial concerns will cast a shadow over government hopes to win approval for the deal.”

Continue reading “EC Sees Heavy Pricetag to UK Nukes Plan”

by pfairley

Nuclear Safety Implications in China’s Bullet Train Wreck?

The hand-wringing over China’s high-speed train wreck last month may have just begun if the government’s current explanation for the crash proves out. At present official fingers are pointing to a failure in the trains’ signaling system. The firm that installed them, it now appears, provides similar equipment for the nuclear reactors that China is building just as fast as it is adding rail lines. Continue reading “Nuclear Safety Implications in China’s Bullet Train Wreck?”

by pfairley