A realistic understanding of their costs and risks is critical.
What are SMRs?
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SMRs are not more economical than large reactors.
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SMRs are not generally safer or more secure than large light-water reactors.
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SMRs will not reduce the problem of what to do with radioactive waste.
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SMRs cannot be counted on to provide reliable and resilient off-the-grid power for facilities, such as data centers, bitcoin mining, hydrogen or petrochemical production.
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SMRs do not use fuel more efficiently than large reactors.
[Edit: If people have links that contradict any the above, could you please share in the comment section?]
These are not my points, they come from the article. So for example in relation to your question on the
they have a couple of paragraphs that give an explanation.
My first issue with this, is that he’s still using his information from 2013. For instance, he claims that the spent fuel is just as dangerous. Yet we have proven time and time again, that the spent fuel rods can be used in other nuclear facilities to generate even more power off of them. We have the technology (theoretically of course, you need to actually build the facilities for this to work…) get even more energy off this “waste”, in turn also making it far less dangerous!
Second issue being he says the reactors would need a secondary power source in case of emergency. Duh? Thats his reason, is that they would need a backup power source to keep the coolant system running… Duh.