They’re working on a new nuclear plant in the U.S. – the $4 billion dollar project is happening in a town called Kemmerer, and has backing from the U.S. government, as well as a company called TerraPower that was founded by Bill Gates.
Why the renewed push for nuclear energy?
Not long ago, the New York Times was reporting on this project, talking to TerraPower CEO Chris Levesque about the context and why this is important.
We (at Imagination in Action) also had multiple conversations with Levesque following his TED talk on the issue.
Levesque noted that with the modern shift to renewable energy, we’re playing with a complex calculus that involves the need for a more sophisticated response.
Renewables, he said, are vital to the future, but they are intermittent, and in order to provide stable power to the grid, it’s important to look at augmentation for renewable sources.
“Nuclear is all about density, and that’s important as we look at the numbers, because we want to make good use of materials,” he said. “We also want to make good use of land.”
To do this, Levesque explained, we can modernize our nuclear infrastructure that was designed in a “risk-averse” way, and could have been much more efficient.
Calling the modern electrical grid a “miracle,” Levesque noted that we’re going to be putting a lot of demand on our grid, with electric infrastructure, things like electric vehicles and the electrification of industry. Nuclear can provide a bridge to renewables and balance to the volatility of renewable supply.
“TerraPower is really founded around this idea of the need for innovation in nuclear science,” he said. “It’s… a field of science that, because of stigma and because of some bad experiences in the ‘70s, a lot of people said, … just put this whole field of science in the corner, and that makes no sense.”
Positing the decommissioning of a lot of hydrocarbon plants, Levesque again stressed the importance of using resources wisely.
“Nuclear is all about density, and that’s important as we look at the numbers, because we want to make good use of materials,” he said. “We also want to make good use of land. … nuclear energy has this attribute of density. It has dense fuel. It also makes really great use of materials like steel, concrete and land. A nuclear power plant like the one we’re building in Wyoming that will generate up to 500 million watts of electricity during the day will only occupy about 60 acres. If you compare that to a solar field, … (a solar plant) of that size would occupy thousands of acres.”
Ultimately, he suggested, nuclear should provide for 20% to 30% of our needs.
“We shouldn’t be kind of competing, one source against another,” he said. “We have to think about what’s the optimum mix.”
This issue is likely to be front and center in ongoing debates about where, in the post-carbon age, we should be getting our electrical energy from. Let’s start thinking about it now, to be ready to soon create that sustainable mix that will drive power for future generations.
