The Department of Atomic Energy, part of the US Department of Energy, plans to spend $ 400 million to upgrade and develop the industry.
The grants will go to those companies that will offer innovative NPP construction projects and upgrade existing stations. "The Atomic Energy Authority is looking for unique / new proposals that will help improve the existing set of power plants and expand the US capabilities in the field of new nuclear energy technologies - both in their implementation and in keeping the leading positions in this field, and also increase the competitiveness of American industry" , - RT cites the description of the terms of the grant. At the moment, the United States has 99 active reactors that produce 30% of the world's energy generated by nuclear power plants. With the help of grants, Washington hopes to expand the prospects for its own nuclear energy and ensure its viability for future generations. State investments will facilitate the accelerated development of design and technological solutions.
The most advanced of them is planned to be put into circulation in the next ten years.
The main goal is to modernize the sphere by the mid-2020s. US officials back in 2013. stated that all the reactors in the country have exhausted their 40-year life of safe work and they need to be replaced. Indirect evidence of their rightness was the accident at the Japanese nuclear power plant "Fukushima-1" in March 2011. - there were installed reactors General Electric, similar in type to those working in the US. However, there is no money to replace, so Washington has to extend the life of the existing reactors. Editor-in-Chief, Industrial Publishing Nuclear. Ru Ilya Platonov says that the US nuclear power industry is going through hard times now.
"In the US, construction of nuclear power plants, a very large cost overrun and time shifts. Also in the United States, the problem of handling spent nuclear fuel has not been solved for a long time already, since the program for the construction of a centralized storage facility has not reached the active phase, "the expert said, adding that without solving the problem of waste utilization, it is impossible to develop. The main competitors of the US are companies from Russia and China, which are active in the foreign market. "There is strong government support in China and Russia. The decision to build nuclear power plants in the US is given to companies, including private ones, and support is not a single state, but only a declarative nature. In this regard, great importance is given to economic feasibility, "- said Platonov. In general, the US interest in nuclear power is much lower than that of Russia, China and India. The Chinese account for about 75-80% of all new power units introduced in the world. Therefore, according to the forecast of the International Energy Agency, by 2040. the power of nuclear energy in the world will grow by 60%, and the American power - only by 16%. In the United States there is no understanding of the future role of nuclear energy in the overall energy balance, it starts to noticeably give in value to other types of energy.
"Today, for almost 100 nuclear power units, the question is how to be competitive. There have been cases in the past few years, when the work of the blocks stopped ahead of schedule precisely because of non-competitiveness, "explained Anton Khlopkov, director of the Energy and Security Center.
According to him, the United States is also inferior in terms of enrichment technologies, so they have to buy technology in Europe.
Washington is theoretically ready to resume cooperation with Russia in the field of nuclear energy in the 2020s in order to reduce the backlog of world leaders. However, this is not possible until the parties resume nuclear security cooperation suspended by the United States unilaterally in 2014. in connection with the events in Ukraine. As a result, Russia for its part had to suspend the agreement on the disposal of weapons-grade plutonium.