I don’t pay a lot of attention to Peter Zeihan, but a get it that a lot of people apparently do, because he effectively projects an image a dumb person’s idea of what a smart person looks like, and I suspect occasionally he’s right about some things.
Anyway, he’s generally been a bit of a wet blanket on clean tech, and perhaps overly optimistic about things like, well, small nuclear reactors (SMRs). Had he been a regular reader here, he might not have been so shocked in coming to his latest disappointing conclusion.
No reason for currently operating reactors to time out anytime soon – these ‘energy cathedrals’ should have working lifetimes longer than your average pundit. 7 US reactors have already been licenced to 80 years, with another 7 under review. The ten or so closed in the last decade were mostly victims of markets, and politicians, that put no value on low emissions, reliability, and immunity from fuel price spikes.
And we can park salt-water desalination and electrolysis water molecule fracturing plants next door and have fresh water and gas for our internal combustion engines for the life of the reactor. Might even have a little left over for the lights
“No reason for currently operating reactors to time out anytime soon”
I would hope not, but there have certain been issues with existing reactors not caused by anti-nuke activists.
Older plants have been sited near and dependent on natural cooling water sources. Some nuclear power plants have had to cut back or idle their power production due to overwarm cooling water (e.g., Sweden’s Ringhals and multiple French reactors). The other problem with being sited near water are the increasing coastal storms (e.g., Turkey Point in Hurricane Andrew) which can intensify very rapidly, or the unprecedented rain-event flooding on rivers which used to be well-behaved.
Older plants have developed unforeseen age-related problems, like cracks and corrosion in systems that have been running trouble-free for decades. At the minimum they have to be shut down for analysis, possible repair, and maybe acquire a rare and extremely expensive replacement part, after which they have to go through elaborate verification procedures.
Corruption, complacency or incompetence is always a problem with systems that require a lot of human attention and conscientiousness and entail big-ticket costs. Humans are big on rationalizing short-cuts and suck at maintaining a sense of risk after a long period of unremarkable operation. (And can we throw in French workers’ strikes while we’re at it?)
Constant pissing and moaning around the edges and side issues. The world is going to be Buggared, the cost will be Incalculable, so just do what is Needed. Including legislating nimbys out of the equation.