Norway has had two small experimental nuclear reactors since the 50s or so, and they're getting decommissioned. Turns out that's expensive. Very expensive. Current estimates have ballooned to 56 billion NOK ($5.6b).
So what does SMR decommissioning look like?
At least this project has skipped the huge NIMBY issue by putting them on ships. And if anything goes wrong I'm sure nobody would mind glow-in-the-dark sushi...
PaulHoule · 7h ago
Decommissioning isn’t usually as bad as building reactors — it’s not unusual for decommissioning projects to come in under budget and early.
FridayoLeary · 10h ago
What makes is it so expensive?
magicalhippo · 1h ago
In the case of our experimental reactors, a large part as I understand it is that they were fooling around in the 60s. Thus a lot of "meh just put it over there" scenarios and such, without much consideration of the consequences.
Another point is that Norway has no way to process the leftover materials, and currently nowhere to store the processed materials.
So we need to ship the highly radioactive stuff abroad, and build a storage facility for when it's processed.
_aavaa_ · 8h ago
Small reactors miss out economies of scale that large reactors get access to. Halving the size of a pipe doesn’t halve the cost.
EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK · 8h ago
How safe are these reactors in the war that is coming?
SilverElfin · 10h ago
Russia built a floating reactor recently too. I wonder if it is too much of a risk though. Polluting fishing waters doesn’t sound good.
phillipseamore · 3h ago
There are hundreds of nuclear reactors sailing around our oceans in ships and submarines and have been doing so for more than 70 years. Most estimates are above 400 total reactors though the actual count isn't really known since nearly all of these are military vessels.
It's in the far north, I'm not sure how much fishing is going on around there, or how a potential radiological leak would spread around.
whaleofatw2022 · 6h ago
It looks like each of its two reactors are a good bit more powerful than what is in an Ohio Class Submarine, but far less than what's in a Gerald R Ford class Aircraft carrier. For whatever thats worth
So what does SMR decommissioning look like?
At least this project has skipped the huge NIMBY issue by putting them on ships. And if anything goes wrong I'm sure nobody would mind glow-in-the-dark sushi...
Another point is that Norway has no way to process the leftover materials, and currently nowhere to store the processed materials.
So we need to ship the highly radioactive stuff abroad, and build a storage facility for when it's processed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akademik_Lomonosov
It's in the far north, I'm not sure how much fishing is going on around there, or how a potential radiological leak would spread around.
Norwegian offshore platforms means it's related to fossil oil/gas extraction.