MIT Expertise Overview’s What’s Subsequent collection appears throughout industries, developments, and applied sciences to present you a primary have a look at the longer term. You possibly can learn the remainder of them right here.
Whereas nuclear reactors have been producing energy world wide for over 70 years, the present second is certainly one of doubtlessly radical transformation for the know-how.
As electrical energy demand rises world wide for all the pieces from electrical autos to information facilities, there’s renewed curiosity in constructing new nuclear capability, in addition to extending the lifetime of current crops and even reopening amenities which were shut down. Efforts are additionally rising to rethink reactor designs, and 2025 marks a significant take a look at for so-called superior reactors as they start to maneuver from concepts on paper into the development part.
That’s important as a result of nuclear energy guarantees a gradual supply of electrical energy as local weather change pushes world temperatures to new heights and vitality demand surges world wide. Right here’s what to anticipate subsequent for the business.
A worldwide patchwork
The previous two years have seen a brand new dedication to nuclear energy across the globe, together with an settlement on the UN local weather talks that 31 international locations pledged to triple world nuclear vitality capability by 2050. Nonetheless, the prospects for the nuclear business differ relying on the place you look.
The US is at the moment house to the best variety of operational nuclear reactors on the earth. If its particular capability have been to triple, that may imply including a considerably staggering 200 gigawatts of recent nuclear vitality capability to the present complete of roughly 100 gigawatts. And that’s along with changing any anticipated retirements from a comparatively previous fleet. However the nation has come to one thing of a stall. A brand new reactor on the Vogtle plant in Georgia got here on-line final yr (following important delays and price overruns), however there are not any main standard reactors underneath building or in assessment by regulators within the US now.
This yr additionally brings an unsure environment for nuclear energy within the US because the incoming Trump administration takes workplace. Whereas the know-how tends to have vast political assist, it’s doable that insurance policies like tariffs might have an effect on the business by growing the price of constructing supplies like metal, says Jessica Lovering, cofounder on the Good Power Collective, a coverage analysis group that advocates for using nuclear vitality.
Globally, most reactors underneath building or in planning phases are in Asia, and development in China is especially spectacular. The nation’s first nuclear energy plant linked to the grid in 1991, and in only a few a long time it has constructed the third-largest fleet on the earth, after solely France and the US. China has 4 massive reactors more likely to come on-line this yr, and one other handful are scheduled for commissioning in 2026.
This yr will see each Bangladesh and Turkey begin up their first nuclear reactors. Egypt additionally has its first nuclear plant underneath building, although it’s not anticipated to bear commissioning for a number of years.
Advancing alongside
Business nuclear reactors on the grid at present, and most of these at the moment underneath building, typically comply with the same blueprint: The gasoline that powers the reactor is low-enriched uranium, and water is used as a coolant to manage the temperature inside.
However newer, superior reactors are inching nearer to industrial use. A variety of those so-called Technology IV reactors are in growth world wide, all deviating from the present blueprint in a method or one other in an try to enhance security, effectivity, or each. Some use molten salt or a steel like lead as a coolant, whereas others use a extra enriched model of uranium as a gasoline. Usually, there’s a mix-and-match strategy with variations on the gasoline sort and cooling strategies.
The following couple of years might be essential for superior nuclear know-how as proposals and designs transfer towards the constructing course of. “We’re watching paper reactors flip into actual reactors,” says Patrick White, analysis director on the Nuclear Innovation Alliance, a nonprofit suppose tank.
A lot of the funding and industrial exercise in superior reactors is centered within the US, the place a number of corporations are near demonstrating their know-how.
Kairos Energy is constructing reactors cooled by molten salt, particularly a fluorine-containing materials known as Flibe. The corporate obtained a building allow from the US Nuclear Regulatory Fee (NRC) for its first demonstration reactor in late 2023, and a second allow for one more plant in late 2024. Building will happen on each amenities over the following few years, and the plan is to finish the primary demonstration facility in 2027.
TerraPower is one other US-based firm engaged on Gen IV reactors, although the design for its Natrium reactor makes use of liquid sodium as a coolant. The corporate is taking a barely totally different strategy to building, too: by separating the nuclear and non-nuclear parts of the ability, it was capable of break floor on a part of its web site in June of 2024. It’s nonetheless ready for building approval from the NRC to start work on the nuclear facet, which the corporate expects to do by 2026.
A US Division of Protection challenge might be the primary in-progress Gen IV reactor to generate electrical energy, although it’ll be at a really small scale. Venture Pele is a transportable microreactor being manufactured by BWXT Superior Applied sciences. Meeting is ready to start early this yr, with transportation to the ultimate web site at Idaho Nationwide Lab anticipated in 2026.
Superior reactors actually aren’t restricted to the US. Whilst China is shortly constructing standard reactors, the nation is beginning to make waves in a variety of superior applied sciences as nicely. A lot of the main focus is on high-temperature gas-cooled reactors, says Lorenzo Vergari, an assistant professor on the College of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. These reactors use helium gasoline as a coolant and attain temperatures over 1,500 °C, a lot larger than different designs.
China’s first industrial demonstration reactor of this kind got here on-line in late 2023, and a handful of bigger reactors that make use of the know-how are at the moment in planning phases or underneath building.
Squeezing capability
It would take years, and even a long time, for even the farthest-along superior reactor initiatives to actually repay with massive quantities of electrical energy on the grid. So amid rising world electrical energy demand world wide, there’s renewed curiosity in getting as a lot energy out of current nuclear crops as doable.
One pattern that’s taken off in international locations with comparatively previous nuclear fleets is license extension. Whereas many crops constructed within the twentieth century have been initially licensed to run for 40 years, there’s no motive lots of them can’t run for longer in the event that they’re correctly maintained and a few tools is changed.
Regulators within the US have granted 20-year extensions to a lot of the fleet, bringing the anticipated lifetime of many to 60 years. A handful of reactors have seen their licenses prolonged even past that, to 80 years. International locations together with France and Spain have additionally just lately prolonged licenses of working reactors past their 40-year preliminary lifetimes. Such extensions are more likely to proceed, and the following few years might see extra reactors within the US relicensed for as much as 80-year lifetimes.
As well as, there’s curiosity in reopening shuttered crops, significantly those who have shut down just lately for financial causes. Palisades Nuclear Plant in Michigan is the goal of 1 such effort, and the challenge secured a $1.52 billion mortgage from the US Division of Power to assist with the prices of reviving it. Holtec, the plant’s proprietor and operator, is aiming to have the ability again on-line in 2025.
Nonetheless, the NRC has reported doable harm to a number of the tools on the plant, particularly the steam mills. Relying on the extent of the repairs wanted, the extra price might doubtlessly make reopening uneconomical, White says.
A reactor on the former Three Mile Island Nuclear Facility is one other goal. The positioning’s proprietor says the reactor might be working once more by 2028, although battles over connecting the plant to the grid might play out within the coming yr or so. Lastly, the house owners of the Duane Arnold Power Middle in Iowa are reportedly contemplating reopening the nuclear plant, which shut down in 2020.
Large Tech’s large urge for food
One of many components driving the rising urge for food for nuclear energy is the gorgeous development of AI, which depends on information facilities requiring an enormous quantity of vitality. Final yr introduced new curiosity from tech giants trying to nuclear as a possible answer to the AI energy crunch.
Microsoft had a significant hand in plans to reopen the reactor at Three Mile Island—the corporate signed a deal in 2024 to buy energy from the ability if it’s capable of reopen. And that’s only the start.
Google signed a cope with Kairos Energy in October 2024 that may see the startup construct as much as 500 megawatts’ price of energy crops by 2035, with Google buying the vitality. Amazon went one step additional than these offers, investing straight in X-energy, an organization constructing small modular reactors. The cash will straight fund the event, licensing, and building of a challenge in Washington.
Funding from large tech corporations might be a significant assist in preserving current reactors working and getting superior initiatives off the bottom, however many of those commitments to date are imprecise, says Good Power Collective’s Lovering. Main milestones to observe for embody large monetary commitments, contracts signed, and purposes submitted to regulators, she says.
“Nuclear had an unimaginable 2024, in all probability probably the most thrilling yr for nuclear in lots of a long time,” says Staffan Qvist, a nuclear engineer and CEO of Quantified Carbon, a global consultancy centered on decarbonizing vitality and business. Deploying it on the scale required might be an enormous problem, however curiosity is ratcheting up. As he places it, “There’s an enormous world on the market hungry for energy.”