The U.S. government is shelling out a whopping $2.7 billion to three companies in an effort to strengthen domestic uranium enrichment, amid surging electricity demand from AI data centers.
The Department of Energy announced on Monday that it will award $900 million each to American Centrifuge Operating and Orano Federal Services, as well as General Matter, a nuclear startup backed by billionaire investor Peter Thiel.
The funding will be distributed through task orders over the next 10 years, under what the department described as a “strict milestone approach.”
That’s just… not true. Nuclear absolutely makes sense, it’s just that there’s not enough public appetite for it. In particular, small modular reactors (SMRs) are very much needed for distributed power generation.
There’s not enough storage with renewables that can compete with nuclear. The technology that currently exists doesn’t scale from a cost perspective, which is why the storage startup space has become so hot in the last 5 years.
Nuclear is way more expensive than renewables, it’s not public appetite, it’s that it’s impossible to get funding if you can’t get a government to cover the cost. Another reason lenders are jumpy is that nuclear frequently goes way over budget and takes longer than initially estimated.
By the way, last I checked SMRs don’t exist in any meaningful capacity.
Sodium ion batteries are already on the market, they’re much cheaper than lithium, work across a far wider range of temps, they don’t catch fire, don’t lose capacity over many charge cycles, and sodium is cheap and abundant. New nuclear takes at least 10 years to build, typically longer. By then sodium batteries will be everywhere, as well as repurposed batteries from older EVs.
What’s the argument for new nuclear? Make it make sense.
Nuclear has a better value-adjusted levelized cost of energy. SMRs are very much developing but have been deployed in some areas outside the US.
Sodium ion batteries are great for many reasons but also aren’t as energy dense, so you need a way larger footprint. I’m not saying we should only do one of the other, it’s all of the above. Also repurposed EVs aren’t really a thing at scale, nor does there seem to be that much investment into it from a quick search. The main investment is into full recycling of batteries.
I don’t think you can win the economic argument, everything I’ve seen suggests nuclear is far more expensive and it’s not getting cheaper, whereas renewables are but if you’ve got sources, by all means let’s see them.
Sodium batteries don’t require a way larger footprint, it’s true they’re not quite as energy dense but they’re being used in EVs in China, there’s a little reduction in range for the same size pack but they’re way better in extreme cold and heat so you’re not drawing as much power to condition the battery.
If we’re talking 10-15 years from now, when a new nuclear plant would come online, there’s going to be a lot of EV batteries around. Maybe they get recycled but that seems a waste when they’ve only lost a little capacity. I guess we’ll see.
https://www.iea.org/reports/projected-costs-of-generating-electricity-2020
That’s 6 years old and written in conjunction with the NEA.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_Energy_Agency
Still there’s this from that report:
In the US, at least nuclear is much more expensive than wind and solar.
Here’s last year’s figures. Nuclear is crazy expensive.
https://www.lazard.com/research-insights/levelized-cost-of-energyplus-lcoeplus/