One reason is the completion of a nuclear reactor in the United Arab Emirates – after a relatively short planning and construction period of twelve years. For comparison: The “European Pressurized Water Reactor” (EPR) in Olkiluoto, Finland, should already 2012 go online, but will not go online before 2022 produce electricity. There are also a number of new projects that promise to make nuclear energy safer and cheaper: modular, sodium-cooled reactors, pebble-bed and traveling-wave reactors.

Wolfgang Stieler, editor of the magazine “Technology Review”, expresses himself skeptically in the TR podcast “Tech2go” that any of these concepts can really help nuclear energy to achieve a renaissance: The Reactor in the Emirates is cheaper than the EPR, which is still under construction, but technically outdated and accordingly unsafe. It lacks a “core catcher” that is supposed to catch the liquid, highly radioactive metal in the event of a core meltdown before it eats its way into the ground. And the other approaches may be safer, but whether they are really economical is highly doubtful, according to Stieler.

The TR editor is more optimistic about nuclear fusion. According to Stieler, it is said to be finished in 50 years. But private companies with comparatively small and flexible reactors are currently making reasonable hopes that the deadline “but this time really” could be reduced to a few decades.

In the current issue 12 / 2020 of the Technology Review, Stieler has also summarized the current status in two articles (now at the kiosk or to order online).

The whole episode as audio stream (RSS feed) to listen to and download:

Here you can find the previous episodes of “Tech2go”. (grh)