Where nuclear has failed, at Vogtle in South Carolina, at VC Summer in Georgia, at Wylfa, all of EDFs projects, the failure hasn't been from funding showing up and disappearing. It hasn't been from regulations changing.
It's all been due to lack of expertise and project mismanagement. In the US they plowed forward with designs that "couldn't be constructed" and wasted money building something different from what had been designed. With the French EPR design, welding skills weren't there to deal with insanely complex and difficult welding jobs.
The failures of nuclear construction have been internal to the industry, they haven't been foisted on the industry.
We should build now with the clear path we have to 80%-90% decarbonization, and see where the chips fall.
So I think we are in agreement there? Maybe in 2045 NuScale (Or Terrapower or whoever) will be shipping reliably and have brought down costs quite a bit from what they currently think they can hit. Maybe not, and we will go with whatever the cheapest alternative is to meet our reliability needs.
There's certainly adequate VC money to get these nuclear startups off the ground. Personally, I don't think any of it is "smart" money, but rather just hedging money. Which is to say I'm really glad that people are investing in it, even though I don't think it's a likely bet, it's a necessary bet.
It's all been due to lack of expertise and project mismanagement. In the US they plowed forward with designs that "couldn't be constructed" and wasted money building something different from what had been designed. With the French EPR design, welding skills weren't there to deal with insanely complex and difficult welding jobs.
The failures of nuclear construction have been internal to the industry, they haven't been foisted on the industry.
We should build now with the clear path we have to 80%-90% decarbonization, and see where the chips fall.
So I think we are in agreement there? Maybe in 2045 NuScale (Or Terrapower or whoever) will be shipping reliably and have brought down costs quite a bit from what they currently think they can hit. Maybe not, and we will go with whatever the cheapest alternative is to meet our reliability needs.
There's certainly adequate VC money to get these nuclear startups off the ground. Personally, I don't think any of it is "smart" money, but rather just hedging money. Which is to say I'm really glad that people are investing in it, even though I don't think it's a likely bet, it's a necessary bet.