nuclear

The Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) loan programs have made more than $30 billion in loans and loan guarantees, but it has not fully developed or consistently stuck to loan monitoring policies, an official from the Government Accountability Office testified before a House subcommittee on May 30.  Congress authorized the Loan Guarantee Program (LGP) in 2005 […]

Construction of China’s first high-temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTR) demonstration plant kicked off this April after pouring of concrete for the basemat of the Generation IV reactor was completed. Though

For the first time ever, the U.S. has filed criminal charges against known state actors for hacking U.S. interests. A grand jury in the Western District of Pennsylvania indicted five Chinese military hackers for computer hacking, economic espionage, and other offenses directed at six American victims in the U.S. nuclear power, metals, and solar products […]

A German court on April 14 reaffirmed that a nuclear fuel rod tax is unconstitutional and has ordered federal tax authorities to reimburse €2.2. billion ($3.04 billion) paid by five nuclear-owning utilities until compatibility with European and German law is established.  The Financial Court of Hamburg had held in January 2013 that the federal nuclear […]

By 2035, renewables will hold a 30% share of the global power mix, but only 1% of the world’s fossil fuel–fired power plants will be equipped with carbon capture and storage (CCS), reports the

NuScale Power is the winner of the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) March 2013–announced funding opportunity to help design, certify, and commercialize small modular reactors (SMRs) in the U.S.  The DOE’s long-awaited second award announcement means the government will invest up to half of the total project cost required to help NuScale Power’s 45-MWe SMR design […]

The Department of Energy (DOE) last week said it would enter negotiations with Global Laser Enrichment (GLE) for the sale of the depleted uranium hexafluoride inventory after it selected the GE-Hitachi division’s proposal to build and operate a laser enrichment facility at the shuttered Paducah enrichment site in Kentucky. The DOE will also enter into […]

In 1973, an obscure economist from Britain’s National Coal Board, which then owned and operated all the coal mines in the country, published a book that posited—as the title proclaimed—that Small Is

South Korea in the past week indicted 100 people—including officials from the state-run nuclear power plant operator—of corruption in a scandal over forged nuclear safety certifications. It is now also considering freezing ambitions to maintain nuclear’s 29% share in its total power mix—which means scrapping a previous goal to increase it to 41% by 2035. The scandal […]

After 30-plus years of false starts, delays, and political interference, the U.S. finally has an opportunity to make good on its obligations to store the spent fuel from our nation’s nuclear reactors. A