The current fleet of commercial nuclear power reactors across the U.S. is cooled by water from a variety of sources. Rivers, lakes, and oceans are fed through systems that extract and dissipate heat from the reactor cores. However, the recent effects of climate change have been raising the temperature of bodies of water to the point where they cannot be used to cool reactors.
    Climate scientists and nuclear science and engineering experts at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DoE) Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) are collaborating to develop a plan B for nuclear power in Richland, Washington.
     Scientists at the ANL will use Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear (GAIN) funding from DoE to work with Washington’s Energy Northwest (EN) to guide the design and selection of future nuclear reactor cooling systems and their impacts on the cost of electricity in Washington state.
     Rick Vilim is the manager of the Plant Analysis and Control and Sensors department in Argonne’s Nuclear Science and Engineering division. He is leading the research project with the assistance of Rao Kotamarthi, senior scientist in Argonne’s Environmental Science division.
     According to Vilim, the most economical and best way to cool a reactor is to use a local, flowing waterway. These would include such sources of water as a lake or a river, for what is called “wet” cooling. Wet cooling makes it possible to easily conduct heat away from a reactor and its cooling rods. That is the current cooling design employed at Washington’s nuclear power plant, the Columbia Generating Station (CGS) in Richland, which produces nearly zero greenhouse gas emissions and eight percent of the state’s electricity. It relies on a steady flow of cold water from the Columbia River to keep its temperature down.
     However, when considering construction of future nuclear power plants, EN thought it wise to develop a contingency plan in case the river conditions change. Despite the well-established wet climate of its most populous city, Seattle, Washington state is quite temperate and dry east of the Cascade Mountain Range. If evolving climate models indicate that warmer, drier days lie ahead, more aridity will obviously affect the volume, flow, and temperature of the Columbia River.
    Vilima explains that there is an alternate dry cooling design which uses ambient air circulated across a reactor’s heat exchangers to conduct heat away from a reactor core. This would replace the reliance on a river or lake, or using fans or physics similar to those in a house chimney or car radiator.
     Vilim said, “Dry cooling is not quite as efficient or as economical as wet cooling. However, if wet cooling isn’t available, it is your best option.”
     Kotamarthi and his team are able perform impact analyses of risks from a changing climate, such as drought, heat waves and wildfire. The researchers can also provide translation of what that data means for local, immediate decisions. In addition, they can recalculate the data to demonstrate the effect 25 or 50 years from now. High performance computing resources at ANL give Kotamarthi and his group the capability to develop very high-resolution regional scale climate model projections. The current model resolution is about seven and a half miles. However, newer models in development are expected to get as specific as a two-and-a-half-mile area.

Part 1 of 2 Parts
     A long-held stereotype of Southern Appalachians is that they are fatalistic, having a sense of being powerless to change their life circumstances. In a 1965 publication, “Yesterday’s People: Life in Contemporary Appalachia,” described the people. In the coalfields of Southwest Virginia today, there is organized effort among the people to counter this prejudice.
      Governor Youngkin arrived unannounced at a former coal mine site near Norton in October 2022. He appeared at an invitation-only press conference to say that his “moonshot” was to put the nation’s first small modular nuclear reactor (SMR) in Southwest Virginia to revitalize the waning coal-based economy. This highly-publicized media event included statements from the region’s legislative representatives, local officials and individuals with special interests in promoting nuclear energy. They all declared the safety of these as-yet-undeveloped SMRs. 
     For more than a year there were no public meetings about SMRs, only legislative bills to support them as well as a site feasibility study. This study alarmingly identified seven “ideal” locations for the nuclear reactors near neighborhoods, schools, businesses, water reservoirs and even the Red Onion prison with the caveat that an “evacuation plan” would be required. In response to local environmental justice groups calling for transparency, officials said repeatedly that it was too early for public involvement. The officials said their concerns were premature, while avoiding discussing the dangers of creating and storing nuclear radioactive waste on site and the safety and health risks to local communities.
     This past week, Governor Youngkin returned to Southwest Virginia. Once again, he did not announce his itinerary in advance. He began his day holding an invitation-only meeting at UVA’s College at Wise, and this time barred the press. As he left his public meeting in Abingdon at the end of the day, he responded to a reporter’s question about his plan to put SMRs in the coalfields. His stunning remark was that “The state’s first small nuclear reactor likely won’t be built in Southwest Virginia after all.”
    Southwest Virginia (SWVA) Nuclear Watch is a burgeoning grassroots movement in opposition to siting SMRs here. During Youngkin’s trip to Wise County, local activists protested with yard signs and billboards that said, “Don’t NUKE SWVA.” Over the past seventeen months concerned citizens have issued press releases, distributed a brochure, placed classified ads and held the first public SMR Town Hall meeting in Norton, followed by community conversations in Clintwood, Pound, Wise, Norton, Coeburn, St. Paul, Big Stone Gap, Stickleyville and Dungannon. The purpose of these activities was to raise public awareness. One local merchant said, “90% of the customers coming into my store know little or nothing about what is going on.” 
      The activists have done their homework, unlike Delegate Kilgore who is reported saying he knew SMRs were clean, safe and reliable because a panel of experts told him they were. No SMR has been built or operated in the United States to validate these claims. NuScale is the only company given a design permit by the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission. They went so far over cost, after billions of federal dollars in subsidies, that rural communities in Utah pulled out of an agreement to acquire electricity from the SMRs in ten years because of the high cost they were sure to incur. Utilitydive.com reported that “the financial challenges and cost trends witnessed in that (Utah) case will afflict any SMR project.” NuScale belongs to the Virginia Nuclear Energy Consortium.
Please read Part 2 next