Earth911 Podcast: Can Nano Nuclear Energy’s Microreactors Deliver Equitable Electricity?

Earth911 Podcast: Can Nano Nuclear Energy’s Microreactors Deliver Equitable Electricity?

Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. This page may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission if you click a link and purchase something that I have recommended. There is no additional cost to you whatsoever.

Despite its different environmental impacts, together with poisonous waste that requires centuries or millennia of storage in amenities designed to guard future generations from the genetic and acute results of radiation, nuclear power is taken into account by some influential environmentalists an integral part of the post-fossil gasoline economic system. For instance, James Hansen, the NASA scientist who raised the alarm about international warming in Congressional testimony in 1987, advocates expanded nuclear energy generation. Meet Jay Yu, founder, government chairman, and president of Nano Nuclear Energy Inc., and James Walker, CEO of the corporate. Nano Nuclear develops smaller, moveable nuclear microreactors that may be moved to the place electrical energy is required on a truck. These microreactors can generate between one and 20 megawatts of power, sufficient electrical energy to power as few as 400 homes or up to 20,000 homes, relying on their wants — and that’s a lot for a lot of giant manufacturing corporations to make use of in a disaster when different sources of energy are down. Nano Nuclear is engaged on two designs, the Zeus and Odin reactors, for various makes use of.

Nano Nuclear Energy’s Chairman, Jay Yu, and CEO James Walker, are our visitors on Sustainability In Your Ear.

Jay and James provide arguments for contemplating the function of microreactors in varied settings we’ve mentioned on the present. Ocean freight shipping, for instance, accounts for 2% of humanity’s annual carbon emissions, and a microreactor is about the identical dimension as a diesel engine, so it may simply change right now’s engine. Bringing cheap electrical energy to low-income international locations may present energy to run water desalination vegetation and air conditioners because the planet warms and create financial alternatives which have by no means developed within the fossil gasoline period. When you introduce new power platforms, there’s a likelihood to reorganize society for better equity. But there’s nonetheless the query of what to do with spent nuclear fuel. The United States shut down its Yucca Mountain storage mission, the nation’s solely deep geological long-term storage facility, for a lot of causes, together with the well-justified protest by the indigenous communities that reside close to the positioning. You can study extra about Nano Nuclear Energy at https://nanonuclearenergy.com/