Nuclear Power in Millennial America
How Small Modular Reactors and Microgrid Systems Can Reboot Atomic Energy for 21st Energy Demands
The Problem with Nuclear
The public enthusiasm for scientific and technological advancements that literally electrified America in the 20th century began to wane as the culture became disillusioned with its institutions, which could not close the growing gap between socioeconomic classes, political groups, religious affiliations, and along race and gender lines. The hazards of nuclear technologies became a totemic bridge between groups with seemingly disparate concerns about environmental degradation, energy crises, public health risks, America’s geopolitical role in the Cold War, military adventurism, and the possibility of total nuclear annihilation. The change in cultural attitude reached a tipping point in the 1980s, and went from one that could be fairly described as collective effort to one focused on individual effort, as reflected in the revenue structure; the result was the loss of popular support for federally-funded nuclear research programs and increased regulation combined with decreased funding by Congress by the early 90s. Private investments in the promise of “cheap” nuclear power were largely abandoned as construction costs spiraled and ran years behind schedule, and by 1985, half of America’s new plant orders dating back to the Nixon administration had been canceled. The downward trend continued, and in 1995, not a single reactor was built on the entire globe.
However, there has been a resurgence in nuclear power over the last decade, and with serious concerns by the American people about climate change, dependence on foreign fossil fuels, and growing energy demands, the so-called Nuclear Renaissance offers a vital opportunity for stakeholders to view the old problems of nuclear technology with fresh eyes. Sadly, the problems of back-end waste management, prolonged construction schedules, public health risks, and dogmatic ideas about infrastructure and distribution continue to plague the industry.
Nuclear power can and should be considered in America’s diversified energy portfolio, but there are numerous challenges that must be addressed in order to enroll private, government, and industry stakeholders in the future of nuclear energy production:
- American complacency with infrastructure;
- Loss of trust in technocratic approaches to policy problems;
- Special interest influence by the mineral industry for capital investments from Congress;
- Reliance on traditional technologies and science policy approaches.
Infrastructure
America has a deep capital investment and technological commitment to the large technical system of electricity production and distribution that defined American progress in the 20th century. This investment includes the material artifacts of the system (dams, power generation plants, roads and rail, power lines, strip mines, etc.); the laws, policies, and regulatory structure (including people) that manage the so-called “externalities” of the system, such as pollution and global climate change; and commitments that include reliable production estimates (necessary for economic stability), the sector of the labor market that designs, builds, and services the current system, and of course, reliable transmission to the public. While such investments and commitments provide a pretty good argument for the continued maintenance of the system, they also discourage innovative approaches, and despite recent developments in Flint, the last eight years have shown that neither Congress nor the public seem very interested in thinking about infrastructure.
Technocrats
As previously discussed, Jasanoff and others show that Americans have lost their faith in the belief that a technocratic class can offer solutions to complex scientific and technological problems that satisfy and serve all (or even most) sectors of society. While such skepticism may have been earned, private interests have stepped in to fill the gap. Though glaringly self-interested, corporations may seem like an appropriate replacement for a somewhat esoteric class of technocratic elite; but this doesn’t solve the problem of accountability.
Special Interests
A further problem with the private sector’s role in American energy sector is the allocation of earmarks that give preference to pre-existing arrangements. Lobbying efforts reinforce the dominance of the current system’s technologies, downplay its inefficiencies, and strengthen political relationships. Such political activity at the federal level has the effect of discouraging the development of alternative production and distribution options.
Tradition
The mega-project mentality of the New Deal Era still appeals to policymakers and stakeholders, despite the evidence of diminishing returns on such investments, widespread environmental impacts that negatively affect natural and social communities, and recent innovations that render such projects obsolete. This “sunk cost fallacy” approach ensures continued planning and funding for expensive, outdated, and wasteful energy policies.
Solutions
Fortunately, recent developments in new nuclear energy production technologies are now available and affordable, and history can give us some guidance on how to enroll support from industry, the public, policymakers, and the international community for future systems that are more efficient, less expensive, and that vastly reduce the environmental impact of growing global consumption.
Incentivizing Innovation
The current business model for large technological systems requires complex financing and intense regulatory oversight. The “Nuclear Renaissance” turnaround in 2005 involved a federal program that facilitated financing with federally backed loan guarantees, but it was so hard to get that only one company received a loan under the program, and only one site (Southern Nuclear’s Vogtle power plant) could take advantage of the program. The recession significantly changed the demand for more electricity as budgets tightened and demand remained flat. As a result, the utilities stopped building new nuclear plants, which killed the Nuclear Renaissance. Clearly, an Energy Enlightenment is in order.
Public investments and incentives for private sector energy solutions should encourage localized energy technologies, specifically small modular reactors (SMR) for microgrid distribution. This new class of reactor is small and sometimes portable, and creates energy far more efficiently and cleanly by implementing multiple mechanisms of production that utilize the same energy source as it decays. The waste product of some high efficiency SMRs are stable isotopes that can be placed directly back into the environment. This type of technology is designed for microgrids, which distribute power to highly localized destinations, like neighborhoods, small towns, or large facilities (hospitals, schools, manufacturing plants, etc.). They are inexpensive (on the scale of tens or hundreds of thousands, depending on capacity), and because they are localized, they are over 99% efficient because they transmit electricity via direct current (in contrast to alternating current transmission, which allows electricity to travel over long distances, but which loses power at the step down between the production facility and the power line, and once again as it is reverted back into direct current for consumption in the home).
Sociotechnical Disasters
A vital reason to replace America’s energy infrastructure from central distribution at large production facilities to small-scale local distribution is that the latter eliminates energy-related sociotechnical disasters. By its very nature, an SMR does not pose a sociotechnical disaster hazard: its minute amount of fissile material is inaccessible, some of the reactors are small enough to fit in the back of a pickup truck, and they power grids that serve small populations and areas. A bad day with an SMR may be cause for an insurance claim, but would not require a coordinated international relief response.
Uber Energy
The trend toward a la carte services in the emerging gig economy makes this an ideal time to coordinate investor interest with innovative opportunities, and encourage local communities to consider their microgrid energy options through tax incentives and public service messages. Successful efforts must include local politicians, the business community, nonprofits and NGOs, grass-roots movements, cultural leaders, and the educational institutions that will train technicians to monitor and service microgrid technologies. Even retired coal-fired plants can be repurposed for SMR generation, and revitalize the local economies of many small towns whose heyday has long passed.
The New New Deal
There is, of course, precedent for localized grids and widespread popular support for implementing such a plan: the original power distribution grids of the late 19th century were strictly local, and the New Deal’s electrification plan brought light and heat to the rural parts of the United States that had previously been considered unprofitable to service. The technological challenges and opportunities in developing centralized power grids is strikingly similar to decentralizing them: backup systems must be maintained as the new grids are installed and become more reliable; design options, amenities, and living arrangements; and new trades are created as demand for small-grid service electricians and technicians grows. America launched itself into global technological dominance with a midcentury turn, and we are poised to do it again. The replacement of large grid systems with microgrid power distribution is all but inevitable as the developing world invests in this design and leapfrogs past the Western world. Hopefully, the US will embrace its own innovation capital and once again take the lead in the wireless, democratic technologies of the future.
