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NN Asks: What hurdles stand in the way of nuclear power’s global expansion?
Jake Jurewicz
Nuclear technology is mature. It provides firm power at scale with minimal externalities and has done so for decades. The core problem isn’t about the technology—it is how the plants are built. Nuclear construction has a well-documented history of cost and schedule overruns. Previous nuclear plants often spent more than twice what was first budgeted, making nuclear among the power technologies with the largest average cost overruns worldwide.
Recent projects illustrate how severe the problem can be. In South Carolina, the V.C. Summer nuclear expansion saw projected costs rise from roughly $10 billion to more than $25 billion before the project was abandoned in 2017, by which time more than $9 billion had already been spent and customers were stuck paying for a site they have yet to benefit from.
Weiping Zhang, Yiheng Chen, Wenrui Cheng, Liping Guo, FengFeng Luo
Nuclear Technology | Volume 210 | Number 10 | October 2024 | Pages 1925-1931
Research Article | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2024.2304914
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Vanadium is a typical low-activation metal and has the advantages of lower neutron irradiation activation, better mechanical properties at high temperature, and higher compatibility with the liquid lithium blanket. However, the effect of helium on the formation of irradiation defects in vanadium has not been adequately explored at low temperatures (below 723 K). Helium ion irradiations of 18 keV up to 0.54 displacement per atom were employed to study the temperature-dependent behavior of irradiation defects in vanadium at 523, 623, and 723 K. Helium bubbles were observed in vanadium under irradiations at all temperatures, but no dislocation loops were observed. With the increase of irradiation temperature, the average size of helium bubbles and swelling increased, and the density of helium bubbles decreased. It is noteworthy that the average size of helium bubbles and swelling increased significantly when the irradiation temperature increased from 623 to 723 K. In addition, pentagonal helium bubbles, helium bubbles nucleated at the grain boundary, and combinations between helium bubbles were observed.