The Defense of Logistics Agency (DLA), acting on behalf of the Department of Air Force (DAF), on Aug. 31 issued a Notice of Intent to Award (NOITA) that selects the Santa Clara, California–based nuclear technology firm’s Aurora Powerhouse for its Eielson Air Force Base pilot and initiates an acquisition process to potentially award Oklo a 30-year, firm-fixed-price contract to pilot the advanced nuclear energy technology.
I feel like this should have been an easy contract for renewables to win. Of course, the government is going to waste money on nuclear when they could have went with wind and solar.
Agreed. Nuclear is great at providing a constant baseload that renewable energy can supplement. Combine with some form of energy storage to store the excess energy generated and you gain the ability to cope with rapid changes in demand as nuclear has a much slower ramp up/down time. Some countries are doing this already with their battery stores.
So, what kind of nuclear reactors would you envisage to be built and what timeframe do you see in which they could make a meaningful contribution to replacing fossil fuels?
We have reactors from the 90s, so called generation III reactors, that have passive safety features that make them as safe as we realistically can. These ‘traditional’ designs or more modern gen III+, either are good options to build.
I quite like the ideas that Oklo have put forward with their liquid metal reactors that safe automatically should coolant flow stop. In a similar vein, pebble bed reactors can also offer similar fail-safe systems. Ultimately if they can bridge the gap until we figure out fusion which some very exciting advancements have been made in recently, even if still decades away is still within the life span of current nuclear reactors. Then our possibilities are limitless.
As for a timeframe? Yesterday would be a good start… I think they should have already been built and that much of the scare mongering regarding nuclear energy has in many ways exacerbated our present situation. The inherent fear that people have needs to be reduced before it is even anything more than a pipedream. The reality is that nuclear power takes huge investment and lots of time to build while also being a political football. But at the same time there are very few, if any, renewable sources that can provide as consistent power.