Department of Engineering and Public Policy, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213;
School of Global Policy and Strategy, University of California, San Diego, CA 92093.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2018 Jul 10;115(28):7184-7189. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1804655115. Epub 2018 Jul 2.
Nuclear power holds the potential to make a significant contribution to decarbonizing the US energy system. Whether it could do so in its current form is a critical question: Existing large light water reactors in the United States are under economic pressure from low natural gas prices, and some have already closed. Moreover, because of their great cost and complexity, it appears most unlikely that any new large plants will be built over the next several decades. While advanced reactor designs are sometimes held up as a potential solution to nuclear power's challenges, our assessment of the advanced fission enterprise suggests that no US design will be commercialized before midcentury. That leaves factory-manufactured, light water small modular reactors (SMRs) as the only option that might be deployed at significant scale in the climate-critical period of the next several decades. We have systematically investigated how a domestic market could develop to support that industry over the next several decades and, in the absence of a dramatic change in the policy environment, have been unable to make a convincing case. Achieving deep decarbonization of the energy system will require a portfolio of every available technology and strategy we can muster. It should be a source of profound concern for all who care about climate change that, for entirely predictable and resolvable reasons, the United States appears set to virtually lose nuclear power, and thus a wedge of reliable and low-carbon energy, over the next few decades.
核能有可能为美国能源系统的脱碳做出重大贡献。它能否以当前的形式做到这一点是一个关键问题：美国现有的大型轻水反应堆正受到天然气价格低廉的经济压力，一些反应堆已经关闭。此外，由于其巨大的成本和复杂性，在未来几十年内似乎不太可能建造任何新的大型工厂。虽然先进的反应堆设计有时被认为是解决核能挑战的潜在解决方案，但我们对先进裂变企业的评估表明，在本世纪中叶之前，美国没有任何设计将商业化。这使得工厂制造的、轻水小型模块化反应堆（SMR）成为唯一可能在未来几十年的气候关键时期大规模部署的选择。我们已经系统地研究了如何在未来几十年内发展国内市场来支持该行业，但在政策环境没有重大变化的情况下，我们无法令人信服地提出一个案例。实现能源系统的深度脱碳将需要我们能够利用的每一种可用技术和策略的组合。对于所有关心气候变化的人来说，这应该是一个深刻的担忧，因为完全可以预见和解决的原因，美国似乎将在未来几十年内几乎失去核能，从而失去可靠和低碳的能源。
