Re:Fusion energy breakthrough by Livermore Lab
by panick21_ on Tuesday December 13, 2022 @12:42PM
(#33972544)
The reality is that these are learning costs.
If Britain decided to build 10 APR-1400 in the next 10 years with each one they would improve.
France built like 50 reactors in 15 years with 60s technology. Yes they had issue early on but after a while they were completing reactors within 4-5 years and very few issues.
The reality is from 2000 to 2020 every country in Europe could have 100% green energy if they had just started building multiple reactors every year.
Germany could have easily have a green grid by now. A nation like Germany could very much have gone and do that, just as France did in 1980s.
United Arab Emirates has had massive issues. Unit 1 began construction in 2012 and was “completed” in 2018, but didn’t enter commercial operation until 2021 due to literally hundreds of issues. “In December 2018, it was reported that voids were found in the concrete containment buildings for units 2 & 3. Grease was found to have leaked through the unit 3 containment, which may have been due to a crack in the concrete.” https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barakah_nuclear_power_plant
South Korea also ran into multiple delays, “Shin Kori-3 was initially scheduled to commence operation by the end of 2013, but the schedules for both Units 3 & 4 were delayed by approximately one year to replace safety-related control cabling, which had failed some tests.”
Poland isn’t a failure at this point, but they don’t have a power plant yet and their cost projections before delays aren’t very rosy.
Objectivity it’s reasonable to blame bad management for issues within a single project or even country, but when several different projects in different countries run into issues that suggest more fundamental problems.