The nuclear industry dreams small

Business Daily

BBC

News, Business

4.4 • 796 Ratings

🗓️ 28 October 2020

⏱️ 19 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Could the future of nuclear power be the mass production of cheap small modular reactors?

Justin Rowlatt visits a UK-based consortium led by Rolls Royce that is trying to develop these factory-produced miniature power stations. But how much funding does their chief executive Tom Samson think they need from the UK government to get started, and how long will it take them to deliver their first reactor?

Nuclear power has long had its sceptics. Greenpeace chief scientist Doug Parr explains why they continue to oppose nuclear on safety grounds, even as the need to find carbon-free sources of energy has become more urgent. Meanwhile, nuclear physicist M V Ramana of the University of British Columbia questions the business case for small reactors.

Plus, clean energy consultant Michael Liebreich gives his view on how big - and competitive - the market for small modular reactors could be.

Producer: Laurence Knight

(Picture: Small modular reactor; Credit: Rolls Royce)

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello and welcome to Business Daily. I'm Justin Rowlat. Coming up, could the future of nuclear power be small power stations and lots of them?
0:10.5	The technology is promising enough that it's worth putting funding into because if we could really make these things in series, large numbers of them, it's possible they could become cheap,
0:21.2	then there should be a very substantial market around the world.
0:24.2	But as ever, nuclear energy faces a host of critics.
0:27.8	Renewables are now much cheaper.
0:29.9	We have better ways of abating carbon dioxide emissions than we have through nuclear power.
0:34.9	I don't think the world is desperate for small modular reactors.
0:39.1	There is no evidence of that kind of demand. Mass-producing nuclear power here on Business Daily
0:45.7	on the BBC World Service. So it's Tom, isn't it? Tom. Yeah. So Tom, thank you very much for hosting me here. Now, it's Tom, isn't it?
0:54.7	Tom?
0:55.0	Yeah.
0:55.7	So Tom, thank you very much for hosting me here.
0:58.1	Now, it's an amazing building, this circular building.
1:00.5	It looks like a bit like a sort of high-tech airport lounge or something.
1:04.1	But inside here we've got all sorts of...
1:05.9	Tom Sampson heads a UK-based consortium,
1:08.5	led by the engineering giant Rolls-Royce,
1:10.7	which is pursuing what it believes is the future of nuclear power. heads a UK-based consortium led by the engineering giant Rolls-Royce,
1:12.8	which is pursuing what it believes is the future of nuclear power,
1:15.4	small modular reactors.
1:17.7	I met up with him at the UK's
1:19.3	Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre in Sheffield
	...

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