Proceed with Caution: The Price of Neglecting Safety for SMRs
Small modular reactors (SMRs) may be the way to a greener future, but there is a price to be paid if atomic energy regulators neglect their safety as well.
Introduction
Small modular reactors (SMRs) seem to be the rising star of the nuclear energy industry. Compared to traditional, large nuclear reactors, which are capable of producing around 1,000 -1,500 megawatts of electrical power (MWe), SMRs are defined as having maximum outputs of 300 MWe. Despite nominally generating less electric energy, SMRs have been lauded as having faster, scalable construction, lower costs, and more flexible siting than conventional nuclear reactors, while affording a safer and more secure operation. Although no SMR has yet been built in the United States, these proposed attributes make them appear as an attractive technological option to bolster energy security and decarbonize various industries.
In the United States, SMRs have drawn the attention of the artificial intelligence (AI) technology sector, where companies working on cutting-edge large-language models are spurring greater energy demand. According to the Department of Energy projections, data centers are expected to consume 6.7-twelve percent of total U.S. electricity by 2028. To assuage concerns that this increase in demand would saddle the AI industry with an enormous carbon footprint, U.S. tech companies have embarked on a spree to secure nuclear power deals last fall; for example, Google and Amazon recently signed SMR contracts for their data centers. Soaring interest in this technology unlocked over $1.5 billion in funding for SMR developers in the last year, and some companies pledged to deploy their first reactors within this decade.