THE POWER OF SMALL MODULAR REACTORS

On 2 December 2021, Clara Lloyd attended the Nuclear Institute/Nuclear Industry Association annual dinner and, together with her co-authors, was awarded the 2020 Pinkerton Prize for their article ‘Expanding Nuclear’s Contribution to Climate Change with Small Modular Reactors (SMRs)’ (Nuclear Futures, Vol. 16, No. 5).The Pinkerton Prize is awarded annually by the Nuclear Institute for the article that is judged to be the best technical paper published in Nuclear Futures.

The prize-winning article showed how small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs) can be more economic than large nuclear reactors, based on a wider body of research on SMR construction, economics, and supply chain logistics, undertaken by Clara and her co‑authors at the University of Cambridge.

THE RESEARCH: SMR CONSTRUCTION & ECONOMICS
Nuclear reactors are used to initiate and control either a fission nuclear reaction (splitting atoms) or fusion reaction (combining atoms).There are many different nuclear reactor designs, but they all provide the same basic function: nuclear reactions generate large amounts of heat that can be converted into useable power. At present, nuclear power is most commonly used for electricity generation and marine propulsion; however, possible other applications include combined heat & power plants, zero-carbon hydrogen production, and even powering space exploration.

Clara’s PhD thesis, Modular Manufacture and Construction of Small Nuclear Power Generation Systems (2019), investigated whether nuclear reactors could be built from factory-produced modules, thereby shifting a portion of costly and time-consuming site construction work to a lower risk, higher productivity, off-site environment. Her research assessed the practical factors constraining the modularisation of nuclear power plants (e.g. equipment size and module transportability).She applied these constraints to determine how big a proportion of an SMR might be constructed off-site and estimated both the build time compression and cost savings that might be achieved as a result.

Read More