UK Gov to invest in SMR's

[Mart]

Some Gov's would give up on investing in technology after other countries have walked away, after getting burned, such as shale gas in Europe, but not the plucky Brits. We see a move away from nuclear as its economics collapse, and the RE and storage economics boom, and we say 'hold my beer!'

So the UK hopes to hide some failings by putting them off to 2031+, and investing in LSMMRs (large! small modular/mini reactors(?)), which hopefully won't fail to deliver, and be an economic disaster for at least a decade, which is actually quite clever and creative accounting.

Rolls-Royce secures £450m for mini nuclear reactors venture

Rolls-Royce will move ahead with a multibillion pound plan to roll out a new breed of mini nuclear reactors after securing more than £450m from the government and investors.

The engineering firm will set up a venture focused on developing small modular nuclear reactors, or SMRs, in partnership with investors BNF Resources and the US generator Exelon Generation with a joint investment of £195m to fund the plans over the next three years.

The government will match the consortium’s investment, which is set to receive a second phase top-up of £50m from Rolls-Royce, with £210m to help roll out the mini nuclear reactors as part of the government’s green 10 point plan to kickstart the green economy over the next decade.

Ultimately, the consortium hopes to build on an initial run of five SMRs, the first of which could go on line by 2031, to create a multibillion-pound stable of 16 SMRs around the country.

My bold.

My prediction - by the middle to late 2020's, interest, quickly followed by funding, will dry up as the uncompetitive economics of the behind schedule LSMMRs, continue to attract little interest outside of Gov officials.

Call me a skeptic, but if we want to invest money, then it should be in new ideas that may work (or may not), not old ones that have failed for 60+yrs. Every penny spent on nuclear now, is a penny not spent on cleaner, greener energy and storage, that would deliver more energy and FF displacement sooner.

[Joeboy]

Eloquently put Mart. Question, if you could personally choose between a couple of small scale nuclear plants or more coal plants outputting the same power. Which would you choose? Completely noncombatative question.

Neither is a clean win but as we've seen recently there are gaps in supply that have to be filled. I am genuinely interested in where folks thoughts are on this. Maybe it's 'other' gas turbines, biomass, huge hydro electric project?

[AE-NMidlands]

Eloquently put Mart. Question, if you could personally choose between a couple of small scale nuclear plants or more coal plants outputting the same power. Which would you choose? Completely noncombatative question.

Neither is a clean win but as we've seen recently there are gaps in supply that have to be filled. I am genuinely interested in where folks thoughts are on this. Maybe it's 'other' gas turbines, biomass, huge hydro electric project?

Neither! Why does anything have to be huge?
We haven't really done anything about storage (which is needed now) and I would be surprised if anything like 0.1% of potential mini hydro sites have even been investigated properly. Some do seem to be getting built, steadily but oh-so-slowly. How many smallish weir installations could you get up and running in 5 years for the money being spent on just the reactor research?
A

[Mart]

I'd go nuclear, no questions. I believe nuclear is safer and cheaper than the real cost of coal.

In fact upto about 2010-2012 I was only about 90% against nuclear, since it's so much better than coal. But then the costs of RE started to tumble, and the UK decided to phase out coal. Then later (towards the end of the 2010's), we saw off-shore wind CFs rising, and costs tumbling, plus the House of Lords questioning the Gov's claims for nuclear/RE costs by 2030*, suggesting they were pessimistic to make HPC look better, and then the NIC advising the Gov to roll back nuclear plans due to nuclear no longer looking like it was competitive v's RE + storage.

Economically we are seeing the US, France, Germany, S. Korea and others moving away from new nuclear.


*Th̲i̲s̲ i̲s̲ t̲h̲e̲ ̲G̲o̲v̲'̲t pr̲e̲d̲i̲c̲t̲i̲o̲n̲ f̲o̲r̲ 2̲0̲3̲0̲.̲ ̲(2012 pricing)
Onshore wind to be in the range £45-72/MWh
Offshore wind will be in the range £85-109/MWh
Nuclear, at £69-99/MWh.
For solar they predict £59-73/MW

Note, off-shore wind for 2024/25 delivery is now £39.65

[Joeboy]

Eloquently put Mart. Question, if you could personally choose between a couple of small scale nuclear plants or more coal plants outputting the same power. Which would you choose? Completely noncombatative question.

Neither is a clean win but as we've seen recently there are gaps in supply that have to be filled. I am genuinely interested in where folks thoughts are on this. Maybe it's 'other' gas turbines, biomass, huge hydro electric project?

Neither! Why does anything have to be huge?
We haven't really done anything about storage (which is needed now) and I would be surprised if anything like 0.1% of potential mini hydro sites have even been investigated properly. Some do seem to be getting built, steadily but oh-so-slowly. How many smallish weir installations could you get up and running in 5 years for the money being spent on just the reactor research?
A

Huge projects as it's Govt driven, they don't seem to do small and economies of scale.
I used to sit at weirs when I was a boy and have those same thoughts on hydro. That's over 40 years ago. Not much been done in that time sadly. Agree on storage in as low cost, low maintenance and non polluting a fashion as possible. Pumped/gravity/rock etc. Many of across the islands. I'd also like to see vastly more insulation rolled (hah) out at subsidised cost depending on owners financial ability to contribute a small amount. That last bites into corp profits and is unlikely to be popular. When the RE fails to produce as it does there needs to be a fast response fallback as voters who freeze to death can't vote. Can't see the UK ever having 10 days storage capacity to ride out a RE desert, would be great though. We should be self sufficient and exporting as a unified island system. Not depending on Europe or Russia to pump gas & power to us. From that pov, nuclear makes sense but not as much sense as RE that doesn't rely on the wind or sun. Geothermal, hydro, tidal etc. I guess I need to keep that in focus and invest correctly in companies who are moving in this direction.

[Mart]

Just to be clear - whilst I don't want nuclear, as I believe better options are now (2021) available, and nuclear has no hope of being competitive in 2031+, I would prefer it to an absence of action.

But, I don't really buy that option, it's more of an excuse, as is IMHO the 'we need nuclear too' argument. I 100% believe that putting any nuclear spending/investment into RE and storage today, would produce more energy, and crucially sooner than it would via nuclear.

But, my biggest fear is the distraction that these 'solutions' offer, and which can often be used to slow down progress, or a move to a better solution.

Was 'clean(er) coal' real, or just a creation by the coal industry to distract and delay?
Is FF CCS economically viable? It requires more costs, higher fuel consumption, greater fugitive emissions, and yet FF generation is already struggling against RE + storage, and could economically collapse far sooner than we realise due to falling CF's.
Are HFCs for cars/LGV's/and most HGV's actually viable, or a tactic to distract attention and investment away from BEV's for a couple of decades?

So my fear is that this Gov will use the SMR investment as a means to do less elsewhere, and then admit in 10(ish) years that they got it wrong, when every single year is now crucial, as we are so far behind the curve now that limiting warming to 'only' 1.5C is, I understand, no longer theoretically possible.

So whilst I abhore the waste of more money on nuclear, it's actually the false signals that this gives out, that worries me most.

[Joeboy]

Just to be clear - whilst I don't want nuclear, as I believe better options are now (2021) available, and nuclear has no hope of being competitive in 2031+, I would prefer it to an absence of action.

But, I don't really buy that option, it's more of an excuse, as is IMHO the 'we need nuclear too' argument. I 100% believe that putting any nuclear spending/investment into RE and storage today, would produce more energy, and crucially sooner than it would via nuclear.

But, my biggest fear is the distraction that these 'solutions' offer, and which can often be used to slow down progress, or a move to a better solution.

Was 'clean(er) coal' real, or just a creation by the coal industry to distract and delay?
Is FF CCS economically viable? It requires more costs, higher fuel consumption, greater fugitive emissions, and yet FF generation is already struggling against RE + storage, and could economically collapse far sooner than we realise due to falling CF's.
Are HFCs for cars/LGV's/and most HGV's actually viable, or a tactic to distract attention and investment away from BEV's for a couple of decades?

So my fear is that this Gov will use the SMR investment as a means to do less elsewhere, and then admit in 10(ish) years that they got it wrong, when every single year is now crucial, as we are so far behind the curve now that limiting warming to 'only' 1.5C is, I understand, no longer theoretically possible.

So whilst I abhore the waste of more money on nuclear, it's actually the false signals that this gives out, that worries me most.

Strongly agreed.

[Adokforme]

Geothermal, hydro, tidal etc. I guess I need to keep that in focus and invest correctly in companies who are moving in this direction.

Not a recommendation but certainly something to think about!

https://www.seedrs.com/achelousenergy

[spread-tee]

Mart says,

So my fear is that this Gov will use the SMR investment as a means to do less elsewhere, and then admit in 10(ish) years that they got it wrong, when every single year is now crucial, as we are so far behind the curve now that limiting warming to 'only' 1.5C is, I understand, no longer theoretically possible.

So whilst I abhore the waste of more money on nuclear, it's actually the false signals that this gives out, that worries me most.



Absolutely agree with that, if it's a delaying tactic it would be catastrophic, if it's a part of the "throw everything including the kitchen sink" at it plan
I can live with it.

Desp

[Mr Gus]

Joe, we ought invest in Archimedes screw small scale we'd hydro to all up our 24/7 renewables, weirs are everywhere a river is at, many are suitable, ...& ought be implemented, the one put in at Bedford I imagine is now cost effective with current prices having reduced its payback period significantly (installed 2012 for £500,000)

It grinds away producing around 320,000 units per annum (has fish & eel channels to the side)

Hmm, national lottery, large green schemes, you never hear about them out to use in this societal manner.
Would be nice.

Seems to be used to prop up plenty of crumbling theatres.

Nb if each mini reactor "only" has the footprint of a football field ...build some in london