In a hungry world, America's “new nuclear posture” is critical. – Watt?

Providing customers with affordable, sufficient, reliable, available and clean electricity is critical to the quality of modern life. The recently announced data center surge, which will require doubling or even tripling power supplies, will put a strain on current infrastructure. Now is the time to spark the conversation about reliable, continuous, uninterrupted, emissions-free unlimited power generation to meet the needs of end users.

Fragile grids and the intermittency of low-density wind and solar generation methods threaten to meet such increased power demand. Mature nuclear power production technology is our only real hope of meeting rapidly growing demand.

For nearly 70 years, nuclear power has powered the U.S. Navy, France and other countries around the world. The technology is well known and has the best safety record (based on injuries and fatalities) of any industry. The materials left behind in the current light water reactor can be recycled, and the power generation capacity is 30 times that of the first reactor. Such advantages could provide energy security to billions of people around the world, greatly improving their quality of life and alleviating everyone’s fear of not having reliable, constant power.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) continues to advocate for nuclear energy to provide consumers with dispatchable power at the lowest cost.

The most recent report released by the U.S. Department of Energy for September 2024 stated: “Road to Business Takeoff Report” summarizes advanced nuclear energy including a range of proven innovative technologies and defines three size categories of reactor design (large, small and micro):

• Large: Fast neutron breeders and light water generators (typically ~1000 MW) are critical for large-capacity power production.
• Small modular reactors (SMRs) are generally considered to be around 50 to 350 MW, with options available for individual customers.
• Microreactors can serve a variety of use cases where reliability, transportability, and compactness are highly valued.

Nuclear power generation is proliferating around the world:

• France has more than 50 nuclear reactors, producing more than 70% of France's electricity.
• Currently, approximately 440 nuclear reactors are operating in 32 countries and Taiwan, of which 62 new reactors are under construction. As of August 1, 2023, the United States has 54 nuclear power plants in 28 states, including 93 operating commercial nuclear reactors. These power plants account for about 20% of the country's electricity generation. Nuclear power's competitive advantage is that it is the only baseload power source that can meet the need to provide emission-free, continuous, uninterrupted and timely supply of clean electricity to end users.
• Nuclear power systems developed for the Navy have worked well for more than seventy years. All U.S. Navy submarines and aircraft carriers are nuclear powered. Other military branches are now on board. The Navy's seven-decade safety record in supporting national security in nuclear power generation began before the creation of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and all its regulatory hurdles.
• Today, approximately 60 reactors are under construction around the world. An additional 110 are planned. Most of the reactors under construction or planned are in China.

Filmmaker Oliver Stone released a film called “Nuclear Now.” This movie is educational and entertaining. Oliver Stone points out several other reasons to support Nuclear Now:

• The U.S. Navy's more than 40 nuclear-powered submarines can stay underwater for months and travel thousands of miles without refueling.
• In more than 70 years of operation, Navy nuclear reactors have accumulated the equivalent of more than 6,000 years of experience in nuclear reactor safety.
• Nuclear energy is the safest way to generate emissions-free electricity. According to the internationally recognized official death statistics from Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima, the total death toll from the three major nuclear accidents is up to 32 people. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the combined effects of outdoor and household air pollution cause around 7 million premature deaths each year.

Considering that people pay extra taxes to subsidize coal and natural gas generation, and that subsidies for wind and solar generation are 100 times higher than subsidies for nuclear power, nuclear power currently produces the cheapest electricity today.

Instead of pursuing renewable energy sources such as wind and solar that require large land occupations, huge taxpayer subsidies, and even only sporadically generate electricity, we must focus our technological resources on our nuclear power production industry, which has the best of all companies Record of industrial safety and record of producing the cheapest unsubsidized, zero-emission electricity.

For nearly 45 years, our government has struggled to fulfill its responsibility to “dispose” of our “nuclear waste.” Since this “waste” can be recycled and therefore is a valuable asset, we call it lightly used nuclear fuel (SUNF), since this fuel only realizes about 3% of its electricity potential. We are on the cusp of a revolutionary innovation in electricity production, and only our federal government is standing in the way of this change.

This recycling technology is called “fast reactor recycling”, or “fast breeder reactor”. Surprisingly, this technology existed long before current light water reactor technology existed. It works well, produces electricity at very low cost, and has better safety features than the existing fleet.

Meanwhile, despite the Department of Energy’s continued support for the nuclear energy movement, the United States remains content to bury its head in the sand while France and other countries move to reliable, dispatchable, and zero-emission nuclear power. The US seems to be focused on wind and solar power, which is the most expensive (unsubsidized), unreliable and non-dispatchable! It would also require new and expensive transmission lines, which would impose additional costs on ratepayers.

America's “new nuclear posture” provides emissions-free, continuous and uninterrupted power by recycling fast breeder reactors to meet large demand and smaller reactors, providing competition for lower costs and smaller demand. This seems more practical than ever for improving the quality of life of the planet's more than 6 billion people in the developing world, and for providing reliable power to military remote locations and a variety of power-hungry industries around the world. If the United States does not lead, our adversaries will.

Please share this message with teachers, students, and friends to encourage energy literacy conversations at the family dinner table.

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