holtec

The UK has plans to quadruple its nuclear energy capacity to 24GW by 2050. The government released its plan to get to that figure with its Civil Nuclear: Roadmap to 2050.  The arms-length delivery body established for new nuclear is Great British Nuclear, and in this episode, its Chairman Simon Bowen discusses the plans, and the changes proposed in how sites are chosen and in establishing other routes to market for new nuclear.

Bowen also sets out the latest on the UK's on-going small modular reactor competition. At the moment there are six shortlisted - EDF, GE Hitachi, Holtec, NuScale, Rolls-Royce SMR and Westinghouse. The aim is to get the invitation to tender documents out very soon, he said, with contracts agreed later this year with up to four of them, which would take them through to a financial investment decision by 2029.

Key links to find out more:
World Nuclear News
Great British Nuclear
Consultation on siting new nuclear
Consultation on alternative routes to market
UK SMR selection contest: Six companies into next stage

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Contact info:
alex.hunt@world-nuclear.org

Episode credit:  Presenter Alex Hunt. Co-produced and mixed by Pixelkisser Production 

This week, we’re talking about nuclear waste. In recent weeks, there has been a lot of news on this front, most of which is coming out of southeast New Mexico. The region has a long history with nuclear waste — dating back to the mid-1970s, when the area was first selected to be the site of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant. There were bumps in the road along the way — lots of them, in fact. And it wasn’t until 1999 that WIPP received its first actual shipment of nuclear waste.

Now, new talks are underway about a second storage facility in the area — the consolidated interim storage facility. The proposed storage facility in New Mexico would ultimately have a capacity to hold up to 100,000 metric tons of spent nuclear at the surface in southeast New Mexico. One New Jersey-based company intends to transport its waste about 1,400 miles to the facility.

Additionally, New Mexico State University recently received millions of dollars in federal Department of Energy grants to explore the possibility of recycling nuclear waste.

We talk to reporter Adrian Hedden, the energy reporter from the Carlsbad Current-Argus — who frequently writes about nuclear waste — about big changes afoot for southeast New Mexico, which appears poised to become the nuclear storage capital of the world.