Your guest 100% knows what he is talking about. He is the real deal. I spent my 20's as a Navy Nuclear Power Plant operator onboard the USS Michigan and USS Tunny, nuclear-powered submarines and also spent time at Idaho National Lab (INEL). He knows the industry, first-rate guest.
What's your take on the latest fission reactors? Pebble, Thorium, and others I can't remember. Folks should know every reactor in the world is fission, correct?. Fusion, cold or hot, is a viable future technology. In 20 years, correct? I think the biggest issue with current fission reactors, is they must have a water source, to cool the rods, which heats water returned to nature, and the "hot" rod storage. Thanks
Yea they never sorted the waste storage they made a plan to store in a mt. In Nevada but the locals voted it down so each site has been storing its own waste which is a bad idea however I think there is new tech reactors that can use the waste to make power either way we need to do it
Sorry, submarines are not 1100 megawatt power plants, and subs have the whole ocean as a heat sink should the reactor lose cooling capacity. I've heard so many former nuclear sub people talk about how safe it all is, but when you scale it up, it's not the same thing at all. With all due respect.
Yes he probably does know it quite well which is why it's annoying that Taggart spends half the interview talking about risks with nuclear and far-fetched hypotheticals instead of talking about the juicy stuff investors are interested in which is the actual equities.
@@guyhommeNYC Not all of them need water for cooling. For instance, molten salt reactors use (as the name suggests) molten salt which contains the fuel and the salt acts as a coolant at the same time. Czech republic is working on a prototype that is based on the design successfully tested back in the 60' in the US.
Nuclear engineer here - worked in the industry my entire career, starting while I was in college back in 2011*. The biggest problem with our industry right now is antiquated plants coupled with crushing amounts of regulation, making nuclear fission plants mostly unprofitable. Especially in Texas, de-regulated markets (I know, a bit paradoxical) mean that big gas corporations get to drive the rules, meaning that load-following plants make all the money while baseload plants like ours get less money than even wind plants. The kicker? Due to subsidies, wind farms get more $/MWH even when they aren't spinning (which is most of the time)! To reiterate - wind plants putting out zero power get paid more money than nuclear plants operating at 100%, putting down ~30-40% of Texas's baseload energy! Until nuclear plants are rewarded [paid] more for the baseload service they provide, I can only see a downhill trend for fission plants. Honestly a hard reset might be best, as it would force nuclear regulatory agencies to back off a bit (since they still don't realize they'd lose their jobs too), and the energy regulatory agencies would realize how critical nuclear is to the bottom line, forcing a rework of current legislation. Germany learned this lesson the hard way. All that to say nothing about the public's opinion on nuclear, which [thankfully] is slowing changing, but still overall negative. We are seeing more and more successful fusion tests - that's the only thing I'm optimistic could bring a "nuclear renaissance" (something that has been expected for over three decades now, but has never happened). * If you look up "Nuclear Science Center reactor pulse", most of the videos you'll find were taken by me on my phone.
Take all subsidies away from ALL energy and let a free market decide. Wind Solar and batteries wins hands down. Put a solar array on every rooftop with batteries and most properties would be off-grid for most of the year. Nuclear plants would never get built because no private company would ever insure them - they require governments to insure them and guarantee waste management for centuries.
@@ejbh3160What are you going to do in the hottest (and coldest) parts of the year when the wind isn't blowing and the sun isn't shining? That's in part why the Texas Snowpocalypse happened - the solar and wind plants weren't producing enough to make up for the frozen gas supply. Ask Germany how their switch from nuclear to wind/solar has gone for them. They are buying gas from Russia! If you let the free market decide natural gas and coal will be what is used. Load-following, easy to spin up, and dirt cheap.
@@ejbh3160 the German "experiment" that started 11 years ago with the decision to abandon nuclear energy altogether after Fukushima has proven you wrong. It has cost Germany 600 billion dollars so far and has led to almost 0 reduction in CO2 because of the need for natural gas and coal peaker power plants + it has put Germany in an untenable position towards Russia since the war in Ukraine broke out. In most countries 100% renewable energy is a lie spread by those who benefit from huge subsidies giving the illusion that wind and solar is economical, just like T4nkcommander said.
@@ejbh3160 How exactly are you supposed to get a solar array w/ batteries on every rooftop without subsidies? That would be tremendously expensive given the supply/capacity is just not there, and it means the utility companies would lose money. I find it hard to believe the "free market" would make that decision
What's your take on the latest fission reactors? Pebble, Thorium, and others I can't remember. Folks should know every reactor in the world is fission, correct?. Fusion, cold or hot, is a viable future technology. In 20 years, correct? I think the biggest issue with current fission reactors, is they must have a water source, to cool the rods, which heats water returned to nature, and the "hot" rod storage. Thanks
Absolutely fabulous assessment Justin. As a fan of your daily podcasts I am very happy to see you make the connections between the regular market focus and broader strategic power agenda, making good points about the mining demands made by electrifying everything (largely without thinking), and making the connection also between desalination and carbon free nuclear (something I have been banging on about for years as a way of fixing agricultural problems, reversing desertification and restoring existing depleted river systems). It is so bleeding obvious and I hope you keep trumpeting this message. The key take away for me was that you are one of the first in the investment sector to bravely go to the end game, basically flagging that we are out of environmental time and that nuclear is the only technology relevant to the short time window we have to prevent environmental catastrophy and, essentially, the very real threat of human extinction. Obviously, providing carbon free unlimited power from nuclear is only one strand in the weave but it is the essential one if we are to survive. Loved the put down of the arguments about the risks nuclear poses. As you say, it is all relative. Would you prefer a poisoned, disfunctional, barren planet to just burying a few tins of nuclear waste. It's an obvious choice.
Nuclear Waste: he says, "In my opinion," waste is not a problem. HIS opinion! Did I miss his giving us his credentials? He's a newsletter writer. All the comments telling us he's THE REAL DEAL.. Hogwash.
It's amazing to me to learn how many experts have no clue that the unfolding crisis is in liquid fuels. We don't have nearly enough silver to produce electric vehicles in enough numbers to turn over the car fleet (at least a 20 year process). We mine about 800 million ounces a year of silver, but we consume 1.1 billion ounces, which means we're drawing down our stocks of available silver to the tune of 300 million ounces per year. Since a single electric vehicle consumes 9 pounds of silver, it doesn't take a mathematical genius to figure out that we're already in deficit before we produce a single car.
Palo Verde nuclear plant outside Phoenix, AZ is the largest in the US at 4,010 MW and its in the middle of the Sonoran Desert with limited water. Just a fun fact.
One comment derails the conversation: when Justin says "there is no danger" regarding nuclear (waste or operation), his expertise suddenly sounds like an agenda. We're used to hearing agendas from politicians, virtue signaling liberals, right wing extremists, authoritarians, oligarchs, etc and trust goes out the window. He does qualify the remark somewhat when he explains the unspoken problems with other forms of "green" energy, but let's honestly acknowledge the potential problems with all forms of energy production. Thanks for the interview!
What about the costs of the storage of high-level radioactive waste? "No one knows how much this really costs, because there is no functioning permanent storage facility." says editor of the World Nuclear Industry Status Report, Mycle Schneider
Another great choice as your guest. I haven't missed Justin on any RU-vid presentation for over a year. Clearly knows his stuff. I'm betting big on nuclear as a result of listening to him.
Mining and Processing Nuclear Fuel Material is still Polluting and Environmentally scarring . At what point is the damage caused is the same as Coal Strip Mine .........
Recently here in SW Florida we have had several gator incidents. 3 have been fatal and they have occured along the edges of very small ponds in modern high density housing developments. 2 were in my county. This makes small ponds to be eminently much more dangerous than the total of all nuclear plants and waste storage depots worldwide in the last 25 years. And yes, natives here in Florida are quite aware of potential hazards of stepping into ponds, but no one is out protesting them. Sometimes you have to reduce to the ridiculous to illuminate a valid point. Regards.
00:31:45 "All the ways that you could die, and the probability of each . . . . shark attacks is literally the lowest one on there . . . . when I'm swimming . . . . fear irrational." Actually, the fear IS rational when you are swimming. The probability of death by shark attack is very, very low because a vast majority of the population does not swim in the ocean very often. Among surfers, shark attack is a rational concern to manage.
Great stuff, and Justin Huhn's comments have been supported by top notch scientists like the late Dr. Bill Wattenberg who was a foremost authority on nuclear science and championed nuclear power for a secure and plentiful energy future. Thank you for posting this video, Adam, and I very much look forward to the next installment. 👍👍👍
The war point was very good to make clear that all scenarios that end in nuclear war are basically pointless in imagining as long as there is mutually assured destruction
This interview was a great public service. Hollywood's movie "The China Syndrome" (1979) and Jane Fonda's acting ability actually poisoned the well of public opinion with terror of nuclear meltdown for years. Justin was able to establish the astonishing long term record of human safety as well as the exciting future of SMR's. Well done.
I love that as a nation we want clean air and energy, but until China and India adopt similar technologies, our efforts are futile. We all breathe the same air and they do Nothing to support this transition. If China is building a new Coal plant every week, our efforts seem a waste of time.
I have to push back a little bit with two points, primarily the first one: 1) As I'm sure you're fully aware, the US is not a manufacturing nation anymore, so much of the energy production of China is generated in order to meet the production demands needed to keep our capitalistic consumer culture afloat. China's voracious energy demands and resulting polluting behavior is in no small part to serve OUR needs. 2) To a lesser importance, all conservation and efficiency improvements are additive and still matters. Obviously, you try to aim for the most productive means per fiscal dollar in this ongoing process. But as a nation, you should still do what you can. Especially when you consider how the US has something like less than 5% of the world's population, yet consumes something like 3 times more of the world's energy.
Hey there. China is building more Nuclear than the rest of the World combined with India not far behind. Fyi; China currently have 21 reactors under construction, India have 10 with US current construction at 2.
We should be ready for a major disaster and the way to get ready, in my opinion, is to build 100 small modular reactors (molten salt reactors -- government should sponsor farther development) put inside of ICBM-like silo that is resistant to a direct nuclear attack, electromagnetic pulse attack or event, flooding and earthquakes. They should be spread throughout the USA. We should all write to our representatives demanding emergency preparedness through the use of the cutting edge nuclear technology. We should also ask them: what are they ready to do in the case of a nuclear war or increased volcanic activity when the light of the sun does not reach the ground?
Yep, we need to move forward with more nuclear power and advance our technology to make it SAFER. Western society have been engrained to fear nuclear power.
Negotiating with Russia to end our Ukraine proxy war and putting an end to ridiculous ESG policies would solve the problem quickly...along with nuclear in the longer run.
You wear your politics on your sleeve. Russia will fight until the last Siberian young man dies. Russia says all occupied lands are now Russian. Good strategy - invade, slaughter, torture, negotiate when it turns against you, move on to Moldova, then Poland,
@@moseyalong1 My politics is to try and recognize truth and the truth is we in the west are just as responsible for this war as putin. We're not the good guys.
Nuclear power is great until you have to find a place to despose of the waste. See if you can find a place in the country that will accept it. Would you want a nuclear waste dump in your backyard? Nuclear power proponents like to tout it as "clean" except no one has an answer to where the waste will be placed for thousands and maybe tens of thousands of years that would be necessary. Also, when was the last time you heard about a natural gas plant overheating and or exploding and forcing people to be evacuated permanently from their homes - only nuclear has that honor.
How much does demolition cost? "In the order of €1 billion per reactor. In France, only a third of [the required funds] have been put aside. This means the problem starts once the reactors go offline. There's no doubt that energy companies like EDF in France face a serious financial crisis" says editor of the World Nuclear Industry Status Report, Mycle Schneider
Hate to be the bearer of bad news here, but without an adequate supply of fossil fuel, nuclear is NOT an option. If Justin can not speak to the manufacturing and transportation of plant materials which is %100 reliant on O&G, this is a moot conversation.
Oh God, the confidence this guy has in nuclear power reminds me of Edward Teller’s when he gave a speech at my high school shortly before the Three Mile Island disaster.
Im pro nuclear but your guest needs to learn more technical facts about fission. It was discovered in 1939. U238 can very much undergo fission. The first nuclear pile was build with unenriched uranium metal and oxide. Look at the wiki page for CP1. Also look into fast vs slow neutron cross sections of u238 vs u235
Dude, nuclear power is not "efficient". It has a high capacity factor (completely different concept), but that's so you can make it pay for itself given the high upfront cost. Also because they can't ramp up or down rapidly.
Thanks Graeme, your final point is particularly significant. I work in the electricity industry and can see the massive wave of new wind and solar projects that are now proceeding. Inflexible baseload generation with slow ramp rates will lose money and close in the next few years. I wish I could say otherwise, but nuclear is a square peg for a round hole.
I did not know that. The Natrium reactor mentioned in the video does not boil water or helium gas for the purpose of spinning a turbine. It heats a molten salt that is put into storage tanks. Then when needed, that salt it used to generate electricity. Would this address your concern about "Inflexible baseload generation". Also are you saying that solar and wind plants address that problem? Thanks.
@@mikepond8898 I'm not saying that wind and solar solve that problem, I'm just saying what I'm saying. Heat storage using molten salt, coupled to a steam turbine should be able to do that better than a nuclear plant, because you decouple the nuclear output dynamics from the electrical demand dynamics. I.e. you have storage standing between the two. For the same reason that renewables need storage, to make supply match demand at all times. Batteries do an excellent job over short time frames, we are a bit stuck for options over longer time frames.
@@mikepond8898 sorry I didn't make it clear in my reply, you still need to boil water and use a steam turbine to convert hear in molten salt, to electricity.
My nuclear engineering prof. in college (~2001) said that the "Carter Doctrine" (executive order) banned federal cooperation and finding of research on waste recycling in the late 70's and that basically prevented our country from developing the same tech as the French for reprocessing. Is that right? Has the situation changed? I remember when the SMART program was announced around 2005 there was a lot of excitement around SMR, before that it was pebble tech, ceramics, etc.. lots of innovation, but almost all commercial (in service) designs were still based on those created for the nuclear Navy in the 50's.. that's what we studied anyway.
I have the design of the "perfect" nuclear reactor: 1- is super safe because have no moving parts, no pump, dont melt is case of overheat, can not explode because dont use a coolant like water or any coolant at all. 2- is ultra small, trash can size power is 10 kilo Watts, room size power 1 Mega Watts. 3- can be power off in minutes, power on in seconds, 4- refill each 20 years, no maintenance needed. 5- No waste, the reactor consume all. The government know it, the military know it. But they dont want the public to know it. I can do a video explainig how the device work and how to build if enough people want it. "Because money is power and money rewards sociopathy, we wind up ruled by greedy sociopaths." it entirely skews humanity away from empathy and toward a brutal darwinism that does not make this planet more habitable, beautiful or sustainable. The problem is not energy, the problem is human behavior.
Given that Carter was what amounted to a nuclear engineer (They didn't have that degree at the time but he was of that generation when the field was being developed) and was part of a team that worked to save a nuclear power plant in Canada from completely melting down - and was pro alternative energy, I doubt this interpretation of the Carter Doctrine. Reagan was the one that shut down all the R and D Carter set up to find alternative energy sources - including safe nuclear.
@@valerietweedie4376 Yes, but Carter receive a call that make him change the plans. There is a documentary about the salt nuclear reactors that explain the point of change of directions in the government that kill that reactor. The politicians are puppets with strings, just follow the money.
I switched my major from nuclear engineering to semiconductor electronics in 1979. My original choice was a good one but the timing was off by a generation.
Nah, nuclear engineering has never been a good choice, even now. There are at least 7x as many mechanical and electrical engineers at a nuclear plant than nuclear engineers. I hate recommending people away from my major, but there's very little things going for it.
I'm basically pro-nuke, especially with liquid salt reactors Zirconium free reactors - which shut down by default (as long as there is gravity) and wont burn (with no Zr). But a containment dome is not designed to withstand the pressure created by the heat and pressure of a Zr catalyzed hydrogen fire under 800 F and very high pressure. It's only designed to withstand a direct plane crash. Sorry but that one fact is completely wrong.
The Containment dome is designed to withstand the internal pressure increases resulting from a loss of coolant accident (rupture of reactor coolant system) or main steam line break.
With Ukraine crisis and Russian aggression, we have an obligation to supply Europe the oil and gas they require. Their requirements are paramount over our own.
There's a big difference between bombing a nuclear plant and launching a nuclear missile. If Russia wanted to create a nuclear disaster it would probably be the event they could deny as well as the option that doesn't spark huge military reactions from other nations. The launch of a nuclear bomb at opposition is like going from a 2 or 3 to a 10. Bombing a nuclear reactor and causing an environmental disaster seems like just another headline we all kind of think might happen anyway,.
more energy for more economic growth, part of the problem is certain global steering institutions dont want to solve the "energy crisis" and the expanding economy and population that would come with its resolution. they want to dial it back, they want to control how much energy is used o an individual basis they want technocracy they are the new utopians and they are even more dangerous then the old utopians
Can somebody tell me what they mean when they say a particular energy source is operating at 90% efficiency? Example: Nuclear operates at 90% efficiency and renewables 20%? Is this the amount of time they are online producing energy?
Thanks much for this whole show!! I've only got a moment now but by way of fuel recycling, mixed oxide reprocessing is far inferior to pryoprocessing which is the state of the art recycling tech. Dr Yoon Chang is the world's leading expert on this, and if we implemented it widely, uranium mining could be stopped immediately and we'd have enough fuel on hand in current storage to power the world's needs abundantly for 800-900yrs.
Wow, fantastic, awesome..Justin knows uranium back to front, up and down…he makes it sound so simple…quick …is it because the opposing team( green movement, coal companies, fossil fuel) that uranium was a not a Center of attention as a alternative fuel source coz I can see lots of merits for it ?
Sorry, even for a nuclear fan, who spend his life around these technologis and engineering, the gentleman is a little too optimistic, makes some strange mistakes (80-90% efficiency ???) and is low weighting serious problems like proliferation, ground water polution, fuel scarcety, life time risk (80 to 100 years is scary) development time etc.etc.. Adams sceptizism was correct. Thanks
Nuclear, then geothermal. Deep modular geothermal would be ideal if we can get those within economic range, even at a reasonable cost increase compared to nuclear, since we already have oil wells all over and are extremely comfortable with the risks
This was a very unbalanced perspective on nuclear energy. Huhn is a very good salesman for the nuclear power industry but he is just that - a salesman - talking up all the benefits, minimizing the risks. He lost credibility with me when he said there was no problem with nuclear waste.
SO is completing Vogtle 3 and 4 and have been working on them for the last decade or so and through multiple problems. Nuclear is not the answer to the energy problems but it can help as a bridging technology to help us until green matures into what it can become (it is relatively new compared to our use of fossil fuels and needs to mature with technical break throughs to catch up), the big problem with Nuclear is what to do with all the waste it generates as it lasts for such a long time.
@@lh2623 I am not talking about the direct rods although just the time they are left is a problem. Yes he is an expert and i don't know what all he knows or has been a part of but there is waste FAR beyond just the rods. However it has been a long time since i was directly involved in nuclear power and perhaps as he said the French or someone else has found a way around that.
@@lh2623 That's because he doesn't talk about any waste except for the fuel rods. There is waste for all the parts that are ever a primary or portions of the secondary of any power plant. There is waste for any suits or uniforms that are ever used in conjunction with any radioactive testing like checking the primary water chemistry, there is waste for any test equipment associated with testing ANYTHING on the primary side and the list goes on and on and on. It's not just radioactivity but contaminated water that touches anything or anything that does actually come close enough to the primary to be suspect. There is a very long list of items that the general public never hears about that are also waste by definition. However if there are ways to recycles some of this stuff and it's not just being put in containers and stored away like it used to be, that would be a giant step forward. Trust me there is a lot more waste that goes along with a nuclear reactor than just the fuel rods.
@@rd9102 sure, there's ancillary waste with just about any process. But in this case I have to assume you don't hear about it because that waste is so small and insignificant compared to the spent radioactive waste. If they're now finding ways to better handle the primary waste, then I'll assume they're doing the same for the secondary waste (and if not, addressing the main waste component is significant enough by itself). There's no completely free and clean energy, we just have to pick the one with the least undesirable side effects. Nuclear seems to be just that.
.. Pitty the development of a bebblebed modular reactor with some 2000 people working on the new technology here in South Africa, was terminated around 2010...
" I study nuclear science, I love my classes, I've got a crazy teacher who wears dark glasses. Things are going great, and they're only lookin' better."
what a great interview! Adam your a great interviewer! Justin you need to get out on stages beyond our uranium community. The world needs to hear what you have to say! Thank you for your work!
Mostly agree, but many or most nuclear reactors were built and designed to also provide bomb-grade materials to be refined in the nuclear weapons industry, plus, more recently, recycling spent fuel for DUI weapons, so how to decouple the peaceful use of nuclear energy from the military sector is a major challenge. Additionally, uranium fuel rods are retired after only about 5% of their capacity is utilized to create electrical energy. Currently, fossil fuels are required to mine and transport the materials, build the nuclear reactors and bury the waste, just as solar panels and wind turbines cannot be built with the same low flux-density, intermittent quality of energy they produce. So there is a set of conundrums that have not yet been quite adequately addressed, although some mix of these technologies, including fusion and hydrogen fuel are likely the most forward-looking creative alternatives.
I don't think you are correct: 1.(most reactors are designed for bomb grade materials). If you are referring to commercial plants then that is incorrect. To make weapons grade plutonium you need to easily remove fuel rods from the neutron flux that's in the core. When U238 absorbs a neutron it becomes U239 then decay's to Pu239. But if the U239 atom absorbs another neutron it will not decay to Pu239, so you need to quickly remove the fuel rod from the reactor; I don't know if commercial designs can do that, but a utility company will fail if it has to shut down the plant so often. 2.(recycling spent fuel for DUI weapons). To my knowledge Depleted Uranium weapons like bullets and cannon shells are composed of U238. You don't obtain U238 from spent fuel, I think you get it from the enrichment process that makes fuel for plants, bombs, etc. 3.(fuel rods are retired after only about 5% used). Yes but the amount of energy produced is still enormous compared to coal, gas. And the spent fuel, if disposed of properly, is small and safe. I hear the argument that fission "just boils water". Instead of water you can heat a gas like helium or carbon dioxide to spin a turbine, this raises the efficiency of the plant by 5 to 10 percent (I heard). The spent fuel from fission seems to be the easiest to deal with. I understand that the reactors, after permanent shutdown and all fuel removed, are still radioactive and is costs too much money to decommission them. But fusion is still 30 years away (I mean a fusion plant that operates 24x7x365 for 4 decades). I hope to see fusion in my lifetime.
Good morning Adam, I have been thinking this for awhile, sooo please talk this up in the media if you consider it worthy. There is a world war II tech called wood gasification that has the potential to save lives in Europe. It uses filtered wood smoke/gases. You can run a car engine but more importantly you can run generators on this. In European energy shortage more energy could save remote households lives. It is tricky to get right with proper filtration but utube has many videos on this forgotten tech. Soo nuclear takes decades to plan/build, these wood gas use anything from wood pellets to leaves to burn. This can be built and refined in short order. PLEASE PASS THIS ON if you deem it worthy.
