Hope, Hype, Hubris, and Deep Decarbonisation feat. Nick Touran

Nick Touran is a Ph.D. nuclear engineer and advanced reactor
designer who runs the science education website whatisnuclear.com.
Advanced and Small Modular Reactors have become the only
politically safe nuclear power that western politicians are willing
to touch with a 10 foot pole. Meanwhile existing plants doing much
of the heavy lifting of decarbonisation are facing politically
motivated premature closures and new builds of existing designs are
seen as politically and financially unfeasible. There is a lot of
hype around thorium, molten salt reactors, breeders and burners.
There are also a lot of unanswered questions these designs will
face if and when they are exposed to the challenges of existing in
real life. Banking the West’s nuclear future and our climate
response on potential paper tigers is a high risk move given the
stakes and timeline of climate change.