NextEra CEO ‘not bullish’ on SMRs as company assesses potential Duane Arnold restart
“There are only a few nuclear plants that can be recommissioned in an economic way,” and newer technologies like small modular reactors remain financially infeasible, CEO John Ketchum said.

Published Oct. 24, 2024
By Emma Penrod

Dive Brief:

• NextEra Energy continues to evaluate the possibility of reopening the Duane Arnold nuclear power plant in Iowa amid growing interest from data center companies, CEO John Ketchum told investors Thursday during a third quarter earnings call.
• Duane Arnold’s boiling water reactor could make it easier to restart and operate economically than other nuclear power plants, Ketchum said. New nuclear technologies like small modular reactors remain uneconomical, Ketchum said.
• Nuclear will likely supply just a fraction of the 900 GW the U.S. needs to add by 2040 to keep up with demand, Ketchum said.

Dive Insight:
Despite the recent fervor among tech companies and investors about nuclear energy, Ketchum held that renewables and storage will likely play a greater role in meeting new energy demand for at least two decades to come.

“Nuclear will play a role, but there are some practical limitations,” he said. “There are only a few nuclear plants that can be recommissioned in an economic way ... But even with a 100% success rate on those recommissionings, we would still only meet less than 1% of that [new] demand.”

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But Ketchum said he was “not bullish” on the newer SMR technology. NextEra has an in-house team dedicated to SMRs, he said, but so far they have not drawn favorable conclusions about the technology.

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Ketchum also raised questions about the availability of nuclear fuel in the United States, and noted that SMRs remain “very expensive” even as the cost of renewable energy continues to fall.

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