America's Energy Department Works With Bill Gates To Test Mini Nuclear Reactors (washingtonexaminer.com)

An anonymous reader quotes the Washington Examiner: The Energy Department is participating in a major push with electric utility Southern and a company founded by Microsoft founder Bill Gates to develop small nuclear power reactors that are less expensive and more efficient than their much larger cousins. "Molten salt reactors are getting a reboot," the Energy Department tweeted late Wednesday, offering a schematic of a battery-like power plant module that "could power America's energy"... The Department of Energy linked to a detailed description of how its Oak Ridge National Laboratory and other federal labs are teaming up with Southern Company, a big coal utility with several nuclear plants, and Gates' TerraPower to test and develop a type of reactor that uses liquefied sodium "as both coolant and fuel."

These liquid-metal reactors are sometimes referred to as nuclear batteries because they are small, self-contained units, which theoretically can be deployed anywhere, although the version being tested at Oak Ridge appears to be one requiring a permanent structure and housing. TerraPower was awarded a $40 million award by the Energy Department in 2016 to pursue the project.
Currently it's in the "early design phase" to assess commercial viability, but testing will begin in 2019, "which will help validate the reactor's safety systems for license certification by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission."

Comments

Hoping this gets done.

[Chas]

Because small, unitized reactors that can be easily dropped into place, and later removed and refurbished could make all the difference in the nuclear industry.

Then, you can strategically drop a reactor wherever you need steady power and encase it in a concrete/steel/lead sarcophagus and only address it again when the core needs replacing. This can help with the issues involved in building large nuclear facilities in danger-prone areas (like California).

Or, if you need more power, you drop multiples in and gang them together.

Re:Hoping this gets done.

[toejam13]

Don't forget that these reactors can be built on an assembly line. That allows for a stable supply chain, a controlled building environment, and the chance for workers to gain experience in assembling the devices. That should dramatically help in stabilizing costs.

Re:Every 10 year

[crunchygranola]

Links?

Please mod this guy down - he is simply making stuff up.

Here is a list of every power reactor under construction or planned in the world.

There are a total of five reactors under construction, or planned, with Gross MWe of 210 MW or less (I presume this is the standard being used here for "small scale"). They are located in China, Russia, Argentina an no where else. And only three of these (two in China, one in Argentina) is a Gen 4 design.

There's 3 or 4 going live in the next few years in the US, 4 here in Canada, 2 in S.Korea.

These reactors exist only in your imagination there are no such actual projects in any of these nations.

There are a couple of dozen power reactors operating in the world with MWe output of 220 MW or less, but not one of these is a "Gen 4" reactor. There instead old designs (>40 years old) in Russian, India and Pakistan which would not be commercially viable anywhere else.

Now there is a company called "NuScale Power" which claims to have planned projects, but no actual projects have been announced (at least, that were not later retracted.) A press release does not equate to a reactor under construction, not have a "planned" reactor.