Read how international collaboration will help bring SMRs, including microreactors, to fruition.
This brings you to another IAEA article written by Joanne Liou. I think it's interesting that the IAEA published this article given that their entire brand is international collaboration regarding nuclear and atomic energy.
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This PDF wouldn't load for me. Not sure if it's because of my computer/wifi or the PDF itself.
Other SMRs are under construction or in the licensing stage in Argentina, Canada, China, Russia, South Korea and the United States of America.
These are the examples I was looking for in the earlier paragraphs of the article. I think it would have been beneficial for that information to be present throughout the whole article as opposed to the last few paragraphs.
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This article gives us a lot of other resources from the IAEA to further our research. I think that's great although I wish they would have alluded to other organizations.
safety concept for SMRs often relies more on passive systems
This is one of the biggest advantages of SMRs. Because of the unpredictability of large scale reactors and past incident in nuclear power plants, safety is being prioritized.
This is particularly relevant for microreactors, which are a subset of SMRs designed to generate electrical power typically up to 10 MW(e). Microreactors have smaller footprints than other SMRs and will be better suited for regions inaccessible to clean, reliable and affordable energy.
Microreactors are exactly what they sound like: extremely small nuclear reactors. Because of the recent uprise in SMRs, microreactors have been a bit under the radar recently and I think it would've been great if the author went into more detail on microreactors, especially because of their range of flexibility and remarkable safety systems.
limited grid coverage in rural areas
Rural areas like where?
MRs offer savings in cost and construction time, and they can be deployed incrementally to match increasing energy demand.
I like how the author both offers in-depth explanations and simplified sentences so people with varying understandings of nuclear power can receive this information. However, I would've liked to see some examples of where SMRs are being implemented and how they are helping communities that didn't previously have access to nuclear power.
Advantages of SMRs
Notice that disadvantages are not mentioned. I think that's very interesting.
Learn more about nuclear fission and energy.
This links to another IAEA article written by Andrea Galindo which explains the basics of nuclear energy. Galindo is co-founder of Baune, a company that works to ensure astronauts' health as they travel.
Small – physically a fraction of the size of a conventional nuclear power reactor. Modular – making it possible for systems and components to be factory-assembled and transported as a unit to a location for installation. Reactors – harnessing nuclear fission to generate heat to produce energy.
I like that the author takes the time to go word-by-word and actually define what SMRs are. This step-by-step approach makes it clear that this article is intended for a general population.
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The IAEA is a governmentally impartial organization as they are run by several different countries including Japan, Switzerland, Canada, et. al. They promote safe development of technology - which makes sense as they are covering SMRs - and peaceful use of nuclear energy.
Joanne Liou
After a quick search, I found the author's LinkedIn page. She is passionate in journalism and uses her professional experience in nuclear energy to inform the public. She hosts a podcast about nuclear energy and very often writes articles covering several topics mostly relating to nuclear energy. She has a bachelor's degree in journalism and a master's in science. https://www.linkedin.com/in/joanneliou/details/education/
Korean Nuclear Society
The author is Korean, so it makes sense that he is gathering information from this source, but I appreciate that he also cites the IAEA.
The SMRs can be largely classified as light-water (H2O) cooled reactor (LWR)-based SMR technologies and non-LWR-based SMR technologies.
Sentences like this illustrate that the audience is intended to be professionals in this field, already familiar with this kind of terminology.
This means that SMR does not represent a specific type of nuclear reactor, rather it is a name for a new nuclear energy product
The author is very adamant in defining what SMRs are and what category they fit into. I really like that. It's not something I've seen often in my research.
The Generation II
The differences between generations of nuclear reactors is very important because it shows a chronological succession of technology development. It also gives clear marks as to where the world has been and where it's going.
what shared genuine characteristics can be observed from diverse types of SMRs
I like that the author is including this. The definition of SMR has been up in the air for a while, because what is "small" and what is not is rather subjective.
Furthermore, only countries with large grid capacity can host such large power plants, and this also acts as a limitation to many countries wanting to start the nuclear power program.
SMRs could make smaller amounts of nuclear power widely available, and that's really exciting for parts of the world that haven't been able to access that yet.
the radiological consequence of a severe accident for one reactor became larger.
Safety has been a rampant point of discussion among SMR use. Having several small units is much safer than one large unit, as explained in the article.
the business of power plants strongly follows the economy of scale.
This is really important. Nuclear power and the entire market around engineering is focused on efficiency and optimization, so understanding economical balance is vital.
[2, 3].
This paper uses the IEEE citation style, furthering credibility in the world of engineering.
evaluates the impact
I'm hoping to see some clear evaluation and critical thinking skills coming from the author, rather than an opinionated piece.
changing energy markets
Supply and demand is also a huge factor. If you implement a Large Modular Reactor and the supply is higher than the demand, you lose profit. If you implement a Large Modular reactor and the supply is lower than the demand, you can't keep up, so SMRs ability to be added incrementally to match demand is really appealing to the ever-changing market of nuclear energy.
in response to the evolving economic, safety, and environmental challenges faced by the nuclear industry
I think this sentence is really important because people in this field have been debating why they should or shouldn't use SMRs over LMRs. This sentence also helps communicate why SMRs were brought up in the first place.
Jeong Ik Lee
After a quick search, I found that the author of this article is not only a professor at Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, he has also earned several degrees including a PhD and has written many articles on engineering topics. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jeong-Lee-29
Also if you click on his name and then "View ORCID ID profile" it will bring you to other works by the same author.
Some SMRs will be designed
A lot of the language present in this article shows how new SMR technology is. Most SMRs are in testing or design phases and haven't been implemented in many plants yet.
current safeguards and security requirements.
This has been a top priority in the nuclear market because of tragedies like Chernobyl.
Some advanced SMR designs
Like what? Are they in development? If so, where? If not, why not? I have so many questions that go unanswered.
smaller electrical markets, isolated areas, smaller grids, sites with limited water and acreage, or unique industrial applications.
This is a huge appeal for SMRs. Supplying energy to places too small to sustain large units would be beneficial for so many people.
SMRs
This is definitely important, but I would've loved to see some actual statistics. This being a government-run site, I don't think it's unreasonable to expect a deep-dive comparison of the capital costs and costs per MWe.
SMRs provide simplicity of design, enhanced safety features, the economics and quality afforded by factory production, and more flexibility (financing, siting, sizing, and end-use applications) compared to larger nuclear power plants. Additional modules can be added incrementally as demand for energy increases.
This feels like less of an explanation of their modularity than a review of their main points that I just read. I wish they would have focused more on what that potential means for nuclear power instead of surface-level vocabulary.
limited on-site preparation and substantially reduce the lengthy construction times
This would allow nuclear power plants to minimize time wasted through long construction periods.
“modular” in the context of SMRs refers to the ability to fabricate major components of the nuclear steam supply system in a factory environment and ship to the point of use.
I think it's really interesting that they feel the need to point this out because I feel like it's pretty obvious. Most of the article is directed towards an audience familiar with these terms already, but this sentence makes me rethink who they were intending the readers to be.
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This is one of the few sources I have that don't try very hard to establish credibility or cite the author, simply because their container is so reliable that they don't need to try and gain trust. I still wonder why the author wasn't credited. It could have been more of a group work, but I still would love to see the names of people who worked on this so I could dive into it more.