Let the Nuclear Race Begin
Nicolas Loris /
No, we’re not reverting back to Cold War. We’re talking commercial nuclear energy. And we’re talking commercial competition—what will ultimately be the life-blood of the nuclear renaissance. Up until now, big light-water reactors have largely dominated the nuclear industry. 104 of them operate safely in the U.S. today and provide Americans with 20% of their electricity, but they represent just one technology. The exciting thing about nuclear power is not what it gives us today, but what its potential is for the future.
And our latest view into the future came just yesterday when The Babcock & Wilcox Company (B&W), a leader in nuclear technologies for decades, announced:
“plans to deploy a North American-manufactured, scalable nuclear reactor using its unique history of more than 50 years of continuous reactor engineering and manufacturing. The B&W mPower reactor design is a passively safe Advanced Light Water Reactor (ALWR) with a below-ground containment structure. This optimized ALWR represents true Generation III++ nuclear technology that B&W believes can be certified, manufactured and operated within today’s existing U.S. regulatory, industrial supply chain and utility operational infrastructure.”