Luuk van Breugel

Project Title: Consensus in Technology Selection for Small Modular Reactors

Due to its low carbon energy production, nuclear energy is often an option for replacing fossil fuel power plants. However, nuclear power plant accidents in the past show that nuclear energy production is not completely safe, and humans neglecting safety procedures can cause massive harm. Technological development has lead to a different reactor design, that is smaller than conventional nuclear power plants. Due to this shrinking in size, the power output of these new reactors is inherently lower. This simplifies or eliminates the use of active safety systems and other support systems, thus increasing safety and simplicity of the entire reactor. Small modular reactors can also be prefabricated and therefore be easily transported to remote locations. In such a location, they can be modulated to fit the local needs. This can be energy generation, heat generation, seawater desalination or even hydrogen production.

At the moment there are 72 different designs, in various stages of development. Some are designed with existing technologies and some rely on new technologies. But in order to be competitive with existing diesel or coal generators, SMR builders rely on economy of numbers, meaning that they need to build multiple units to lower the production costs. However, currently there are no international regulations, so companies are hesitant to produce expensive reactors. On the other hand, policy makers prefer to have many designs competing for superiority (i.e. best designs that are able to capture a large share of the market), and deduct policy from this market behavior. Due to this absence of working reactors, no regulations are designed and the market is currently waiting on first actors.

With my thesis I would like to bring experts in different areas together to work on a consensus on technology selection. If engineers, designers, policy makers and regulatory instances agree on which technologies or combinations of technologies will have the biggest chance to become superior in the market, this will lead to a party stepping up and making the first move. Companies might produce a first reactor because they are more sure that their design will have a competitive advantage; or regulatory instances might set up regulations because they are more sure that certain technologies are safe and superior over other technologies. This first move will create a snowball effect for the other parties involved and will take the sector out of the stationary position it is in at the moment.

Graduation Committee: Udo Pesch, Gerdien de Vries, Katharina Biely