Tractebel is a Belgian engineering firm. Today it released a white paper with the title of The Rise of Nuclear Technology 2.0 that detailed its vision for small modular reactors (SMRs) which generate three hundred megawatts or less. The white paper notes that Canada, Estonia, Finland, France, Poland, the UK and the USA, among other countries, have “expressed a clear willingness to shape the future”. The white paper is the result of three years spent exploring the promises of this advanced nuclear technology. Tractebel invested thousands of engineering hours in technical due diligence and market studies.
     Last January, Tractebel and Fortum, a Finnish power company, signed a Memoranda of Understanding with Fermi Energia in Estonia to cooperate on researching the possible deployment of SMRs in the Baltic country.
     Tractebel’s new report says that “The decarbonization of the electricity mix is what has been drawing most of the attention in the energy transition debate. Yet it is merely the tip of the iceberg.” Referring to International Energy Agency data, the report notes that out of more than one hundred and sixteen thousand terawatts of total final energy consumption around the world, electricity only constituted about twenty percent. This means that any serious discussion of decarbonization must include the whole economy of electricity, heat and transportation energy use.
     The report states, “Given the technical limitations for total electrification, each of those sectors will require a specific energy vector to be economically sound: electrons to power our devices, steam to feed industrial processes and molecules to cross continents. With renewables at the forefront, arduous challenges will arise from each of these three pathways. This is where small modular reactors step in.”
     SMRs are not a single product but should be considered a business model to enable the transition to zero-carbon emissions. The application of the SMR model will help with load balancing and gigawatt-scale energy storage that will assist the penetration of intermittent renewables. SMRs have better size compatibility with market demand and alternative reactor coolants with high operating temperatures will enable district heating, water desalinization and demineralization. Nuclear-based hydrogen production can supply feedstock for steel and fertilizer production or as intermediary to eMolecules synthetization such as eKerozene close to deposits of CO2 such as those from the limestone industry.
      SMRs are relevant to over seventy concepts that address diverse market segments. They are creating “an effervescence within the nuclear industry not observed since its inception,” according to the report. “As in the 1950s, an individual technology’s success will be conditioned by more than mere technical merits. Designs deemed promising also needs to meet market appetite and industrial deliverability requirements. The first SMRs will be online in 2021, in China and Russia, and western technologies will follow by 2027, in the US and Canada. With full market deployment expected within 10 years, now is the right time to move to integrate SMRs into the design of tomorrow’s energy ecosystem.”
      The arrival of advanced reactors is not something that can merely be “decreed”. Instead, it must be “built and nurtured” over years. In the meantime, extending the lifetime of existing nuclear reactors is the ideal way to maintain current expertise. Tractebel said that it is aiming to demonstrate the value of SMRs through “real world” industrial projects and looks forward to pilot project opportunities with interested parties.