nuclear-news

The Nuclear Sector Gets A State-Sponsored Lifeline, Oil Price, By Haley Zaremba – Sep 16, 2020, The United States’ nuclear sector is in trouble. And it has been for years now. While the United States remains the largest producer of nuclear energy in the world, producing about one-third of the world’s total nuclear power supply, the industry has been in a state of decline for quite a while. The nuclear sector has never recovered from the influx of cheap natural gas that came along with the domestic shale revolution, and now the country’s aging nuclear fleet faces even bigger problems coming down the pike. Nuclear, like so many other industries (especially in the energy sector), was hit very hard by the pandemic. As Oilprice reported earlier this summer, climate change will hold particularly difficult challenges in store for the nuclear sector, which has to keep its reactors cooled down at all times to avoid meltdowns. And heat is just one risk factor–there are also extreme weather events and catastrophic floods to consider. In 2019, Bloomberg carried out a review of “correspondence between the commission and owners of 60 plants” and made some particularly worrying discoveries. According to nuclear companies’ own risk assessments, “54 of their [60] facilities weren’t designed to handle the flood risk they now face.”

……..Just two weeks after Oilprice wondered “Can The Nuclear Industry Survive COVID-19?,” however, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) offered the nuclear sector a lifeline. On June 18, the DOE announced “it would be awarding more than $65m in nuclear energy research, crosscutting technology development, facility access, and infrastructure awards.” According to reporting by PowerTechnology, “the awards fall under the department’s nuclear energy programs – the Nuclear Energy University Programme, the Nuclear Energy Enabling Technologies, and the Nuclear Science User Facilities.” ………The wide scope of these projects points to the multiplicity and complexity of the challenges faced by the U.S. nuclear industry today. While the money awarded by the DOE this June is a good sign for the sector, this is not the first time the DOE has tried to bail out the U.S.’ ailing nuclear industry. “Since 2009, the Office of Nuclear Energy, part of the US Department of Energy, has allocated more than $800m to research, aiming to boost American leadership in clean energy innovation and train the next generation of nuclear engineers and scientists,” Power Technology writes. https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Nuclear-Power/The-Nuclear-Sector-Gets-A-State-Sponsored-Lifeline.html