Managing any business is hard work, especially during a global pandemic with stay-at-home orders in place. It requires creativity and flexibility along with some amount of prior preparation. On May 11, 2020, I gathered a group of representatives from several start-up companies that are developing advanced nuclear technologies to talk about how they are making […]
Atomic Show #274 – Thomas Jam Pedersen, Copenhagen Atomics
Copenhagen isn’t the first city name that comes to mind as the place to start a nuclear company. Denmark has decommissioned its last research reactor and has never had a nuclear power plant. That hasn’t deterred Thomas Jam Pedersen and his colleagues at Copenhagen Atomics. Starting a decade or more ago, they began learning about […]
Nuclear energy makes a cameo appearance in Jeff Gibbs’s Planet of the Humans
Michael Moore and Jeff Gibbs teamed up to produce a piercing, controversial, gut punching documentary titled Planet of the Humans. Partly as a result of the global closure of theaters, and partly as a result of wanting to make an impact on the 50th Anniversary of Earth Day, they released their film for free on […]
Atomic Show #273 – Liz Muller, Deep Isolation
Liz Muller is a co-founder and the CEO of Deep Isolation, a company that makes the modest claim of having invented a solution to nuclear waste. The politically unsolved waste issue has plagued nuclear energy development since the mid 1970s. That was when it became abundantly clear that the original plan to recycle used fuel […]
Atomic Show #272 – Karnfull Energi
Karnfull Energi is a young company that is successfully proving that nuclear energy is more popular than politicians believe. They have created the world’s first 100% nuclear energy offering. Customers have responded with their wallets, showing they are willing to pay a modest premium for higher quality electricity. People are shopping at Karfull’s online store. […]
Atomic Show #271 – Improving Nuclear Cost and Schedule Performance
One of the most persistent arguments against the rapid deployment of nuclear energy is that projects are too expensive and take too long to complete. Based on the performance of the few nuclear plants that have begun construction in the West during this century, it’s hard to disagree. But there is solid evidence from projects […]
X-300 Blazing a Different Kind of Trail in Smaller Nuclear Reactor Development
GEH spent about half a billion dollars designing, testing and certifying the ESBWR. Despite that investment, the 1,520 MWe Enhanced, Simplified Boiling Water Reactor (ESBWR) design documents are just gathering dust with no active projects in sight. GEH is a joint venture between US-based GE, a $95 billion annual revenue conglomerate and Hitachi, a Japanese […]
Atomic Show #270 – Fastest Path to Zero
Suzanne (Suzy) Hobbs Baker serves as the Creative Director for Fastest Path to Zero. I recently spoke with Suzy and Steve Aplin, a consultant to the Canadian nuclear industry and frequent Atomic Show guest, about the work that Fastest Path to Zero has done and plans to do in the near future. Fastest Path to […]
Atomic Show #269 – Robert Bryce, A Question of Power
In the modern world, countries need a reliable electricity grid to prosper. Globally, demand for electricity is growing as a result of population growth, new ways to use electricity, and the effort to spread access to electrical power to a greater portion of the world’s population. For the past four years, Robert Bryce has been […]
Atomic Show #268 – Jigar and Jake
Oklo Power recently announced that it had filed the first non-light water reactor combined license application ever submitted to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Their 1.5 MWe fast spectrum, passively safe reactor represents a complete paradigm shift for nuclear energy. It’s not a big, slow to build, hugely expensive project requiring complex financing structures. It’s a […]
Oklo has filed first combined license application (COLA) with the NRC since 2009
Oklo, Inc. announced yesterday that its combined license application (COLA) to build and operate an Aurora at INL was undergoing acceptance review at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Key project specifics Oklo’s Aurora is a 1.5 MWe liquid metal fast reactor with heat pipes to move fission heat out of the reactor core and into the […]
Fission can improve mental health by alleviating climate doomsday thinking
There are countless stressed people who have been convinced that we are facing an existential crisis as a result of global heating driven by increased concentrations of carbon dioxide. In contrast, I get more excited and enthusiastic with every passing day. And, no, I do not take drugs or live a cloistered life. I’m deeply […]
