We often hear about the benefits of deploying fleets of standardized designs to reduce the costs and risks of nuclear power plant construction. The concept is very clear. We repeat. We learn. We continuously improve. However, in the context of nuclear plant construction, standardization is often focused on repeating the Read more
A recent article caught our eye – “Stanford study warns against overnight charging of electric cars at home” in California. This study noted that most electric vehicle (EV) owners tend to charge their vehicles at home during the evening or overnight (which should come as no surprise to anyone), leading Read more
In our recent post on nuclear project financing, we noted the importance of reducing risk to investors to ensure projects can raise sufficient competitively priced capital needed to build them. Today we will discuss project structures. What are they and why are they important? The project structure is how the Read more
In March, Kuosheng Unit 2 became the latest nuclear unit to be retired following the expiry of its 40-year operating licence in accordance with Taiwan’s nuclear phase-out policy. This is the fourth unit to be shut down in Taiwan leaving just two more operating units at Maanshan. When their licences Read more
We previously talked about energy security and the impact on global energy markets resulting from the crisis in Ukraine. In that post we discussed energy security from the traditional perspective of risk of disruption in global energy flows as a result of geopolitical issues. Today we will expand upon the Read more
In the early 1990s, deregulating electricity generation seemed like a good idea. Led by the UK, many markets rushed to dismantle their vertically integrated electric utilities with the goal of creating competition to benefit their customers, the electricity using public. The view was that utilities had become fat and lazy Read more
In our last post, we quoted from recent reports that clearly lay out the environmental benefits of nuclear power. This month we want to start off the year by launching a short series addressing some of the issues that impact energy economics. Today we will talk about the importance of Read more
So far in 2021 two new countries have started producing nuclear energy for the first time. The UAE has put the first unit of its 4-unit Barakah plant into service with the second one following close behind. In Belarus, it is the same story, as the first unit of the Read more
President Moon Jae-in of South Korea followed through on his campaign pledge to reduce Korea’s reliance on nuclear power only a month after his inauguration in May 2017. He quickly announced Korea would stop building new reactors and not life extend those in operation. The objective was to replace nuclear Read more
When it comes to the economics of electricity, there is no report more important than Projected Cost of Electricity, issued every 5 years by the International Energy Agency (IEA) and the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA). This report (now in its 9th edition) collects electricity costs of various technologies from Read more
On October 22, 2020 Darlington Unit 1 achieved a milestone never achieved before by a nuclear power plant running for 1,000 days continuously without an outage, either unplanned or planned1. And it is still running. This unit, operated by Ontario Power Generation (OPG) secured the world record for continuous operations Read more
Last year we started a 3-part series on Saving the planet with nuclear power. First, we talked about keeping the existing nuclear fleet operating as long as possible (Saving the planet step 1). Then, in step 2, we talked about building a new global fleet of large Generation III nuclear Read more
Nuclear power is a people business. Through the hard work of many, most plants operate at very high operating factors and produce clean economic electricity 24 hours a day 7 days a week. They produce in good weather and bad, when it is sunny and when it is dark, when Read more
It’s hard to believe, but this month it is 10 years since our first blog post in May of 2009. 10 years! And what a decade it has been for the nuclear power industry. There were highs and lows, and most of all change….. In 2009, there was still optimism Read more
Nuclear projects are large and large projects are hard. They are hard to organize, and they are hard to execute. We have seen what happens when we try and convince people they are easy – or that we can make them easy by shifting the risk onto the vendor/contractor – Read more
When it comes to nuclear project implementation there is no greater challenge than getting the costs right. The industry can focus on improving public acceptance and demonstrating a need for low carbon generation, but only a cost competitive nuclear industry will really meet its full potential. This is the third Read more
Of the many challenges to expanding the use of nuclear power, economic competitiveness is essential for future success. Nuclear projects are large complex projects that have frequently experienced delays and overruns. Earlier this year, we wrote about the need to build nuclear plants on time and on budget as the Read more
At an event a few weeks ago, a number of speakers prefaced their comments with statements like “everybody knows the future will be based on distributed generation – primarily with small scale renewables and storage to provide reliability”. While there is currently a trend towards increased use of wind and Read more
Large capital projects are hard. They require a huge amount of planning, the logistics are often staggering and depend upon many contractors and suppliers, all who must perform completely in step for everything to come together as planned. The project manager is like the conductor of a large orchestra and Read more
Over the years, when talking about the pros and cons of various generating assets, we have talked about economics, environment and reliability – but more recently a new word has entered the energy lexicon – Resilience. As defined by Oxford, “resilience is the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness, Read more