WASHINGTON, D.C. – To meet rising energy demands, the United States needs to prioritize building large nuclear reactors, several federal officials said during the American Nuclear Society conference this week.
Secretary of Energy Chris Wright, Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Chair David Wright and Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.) said Monday during various panel discussions that small modular reactors (SMRs) will be needed but large reactors are still necessary to fulfill energy needs.
To help meet the expected growth in energy demand, President Donald Trump has set a goal of reaching 400 gigawatts of nuclear energy by 2050. The nation currently has a nuclear generating capacity of 97 gigawatts.
Though SMRs and microreactors have garnered much attention, Chris Wright said building big reactors remains important.
“I thought a couple of years ago I thought all we’d build going forward would be small modular reactors. I thought they would ramp up to scale and we’d build lots of them and that would be awesome,” Chris Wright said. “I still believe all of that but do believe we’ll also see significant building of large reactors again and we can do that. We just have to have some longer term commitments to stand up the supply chain in this country.”
David Wright, speaking on behalf of himself and not NRC, said that large nuclear reactors could help meet the projected energy demand. David Wright cited Fermi America’s ambitious plans, outlined in a recent NRC application, for four of Westinghouse’s AP1000 reactors for its campus in Texas as an example of recent full-size reactor proposals.
“Advanced reactors, small modular reactors and microreactors are going to be needed too and we’ll need a lot of them,” David Wright said. “They’ll certainly be a big part of the mix.”
“But we’re really not going to be able to meet the gigawatt number if they’re only trying to do 50 to 300 megawatts at a time,” NRC Chair Wright added. “We’re going to need them all and we’re going to need a lot.”
Fermi America, co-founded by former Secretary of Energy and Texas Governor Rick Perry, submitted its application for a 11,000 megawatt hyperscale campus scale that will use a mix of energy sources to power it. NRC accepted the first part of the company’s application for review in September.
Fleischmann said that utilities, such as Tennessee Valley Authority in his state, have been able to provide nuclear power domestically through large nuclear plants. He said reopening plants such as Palisades in Michigan and Three Mile Island, now known as Crane Clean Energy Center, in Pennsylvania will help lead to extending the lives of large nuclear plants.
Fleischmann added that more large nuclear plants need to be built along with other advanced reactors.