Developmental nuclear power reactors do not provide an easy solution to management of the radioactive waste generated by the technology, according to a onetime head of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
“Plans to revitalize US nuclear power, which is in dire economic straits, depend on the potential for new, ‘advanced’ reactors to reduce and recycle the waste they produce. Unfortunately, as they ‘burn’ some kinds of nuclear wastes, these plants will create other kinds that also require disposal,” Allison Macfarlane, NRC chairman from 2012 to 2014, and Sharon Squassoni, a nuclear nonproliferation specialist at George Washington University, wrote in a July 8 commentary in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
Macfarlane and Squassoni expressed skepticism about the viability of next-generation nuclear power reactors, which are being developed by a host of companies ranging the Bill Gates-backed TerraPower to energy technology firm Holtec International. The U.S. government has thrown its weight behind advance nuclear technology with funding and legislative support.
The current fleet of U.S. nuclear power plants has for years faced economic challenges including low-cost energy production competition from natural gas. That has led to a series of closures and planned shutdowns, most recently the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Massachusetts on May 31. Proponents hope small modular reactors and other forms of nuclear power will provide a less-expensive option to revitalize the industry.
“Many of these ‘advanced’ reactors are actually repackaged designs from 70 years ago. If the United States, France, the UK, Germany, Japan, Russia, and others could not make these reactors economically viable power producers in that time, despite spending more than $60 billion, what is different now?” Macfarlane and Squassoni wrote “Moreover, all of the ‘advanced’ designs under discussion now are simply ‘PowerPoint’ reactors: They have not been built at scale, and, as a result, we don’t really know all the waste streams that they will produce.”
They cited the production of sizeable amounts of high-level waste from new power facilities, along with hydrofluoric acid that would require additional reprocessing for safe disposal.
