Miniature Nuclear Reactors

Nuclear Energy

Energy is often taken for granted. When I get home, I expect the climate to be comfortable, the lights to turn on, the laptop to charge, and the water to be hot. But ever since interned for Baker Hughes, an oil and gas equipment supplier, thoughts about the world's future energy sources have become very common for me. 

Often on my hour-long carpool commute, my co-worker and I would discuss issues like climate change, energy reliability, and economics. This snowballed into a lot of googling and conversations with Chat GPT about costs and benefits of various energy sources. There is indeed a lot of debate, often political, about which sources are the most sustainable (meaning, the best option that will meet the needs of today without sacrificing the needs of tomorrow). I'll spare you my opinion, other than my deep intrigue of the capabilities and potential of nuclear energy.

Nuclear power was once thought to be the only source of energy for the entire world by the 21st century. However, we see now that nuclear energy contributes somewhere around 20% of the nation's power. Not bad, but far from the exceeded expectation. Why is this? Well, incidents like the Chernobyl and Fukushima meltdowns have understandably demonized nuclear energy. The cost to build large nuclear plants was also greater than initially anticipated. And for some reason, when many people think of the iconic cooling tower shape, their thoughts go to pollution, ozone depletion, and carbon emission—all of which, of course, are not true. 

Safety is likely the most legitimate concern; radiation is very dangerous. Over time, regulations have dogpiled the industry and suffocated much of its growth. With such impediments, is there any hope left for nuclear to expand? The answer is yes: enter Aalo Atomics.

The Idea

Aalo Atomics is a startup nuclear company based in Austin, TX. Their mission is to decrease the price of electricity to just 3 cents per kilowatt-hour by mass producing microreactors, which can perhaps fit inside of a house. This idea might initially sound insane, given the aforementioned safety dangers and the history of plant meltdowns. However, they have a plan that may mitigate these concerns using technology that was actually developed by General Atomics over 50 years ago.

After World War II, many physicists and engineers wanted to stop weaponizing atomic energy and instead use it to power humanity's electrical needs. Understanding the dangers of radiation, they searched for ways to create a reactor so safe, that even a group of high-school kids could walk around and look at it without any worry. They succeeded in creating a reactor called TRIGA (Training, Research, Integration, General Atomics) which used a unique type of fuel, uranium zirconium hydride (UrZrH). This fuel is unique in that it is practically impossible to cause meltdown. UrZrH is so safe because the hydrogen keeps nuclear chain reactions under control—a process known as neutron absorption. As the reaction rate increases, hydrogen becomes more energetic and interferes with the neutrons, effectively slowing the rate down. 

Idaho National Laboratory (INL) has done some of this research with MARVEL (the Microreactor Applications Research Validation and Evaluation project). The reactor is still under development and will be completed in coming years, but many employees involved have left to go work for Aalo. I imagine that they are very confident in the capabilities of microreactors and see a very bright and marketable future for them.

Challenges

Having microreactors power my home neighborhood definitely seems too good to be true. If we've developed a fuel that can't meltdown, why aren't we using it now? Maybe you can already see one reason, which is that it isn't as efficient at high temperatures due to the aforementioned neutron absorption. Fabricating the fuel is also another challenge and it isn't as easy as making uranium oxide, for example. Additionally, the hydrogen tends to escape at higher temperatures. Matt Loszak, the CEO of Aalo Atomics, claims that this phenomenon does not decrease the safety of the reactor, but it does make the fuel less useful and the reactor require more frequent refueling. 

One other hurdle, and potentially the most difficult challenge, is the regulations. Over the years, a seemingly infinite list of regulations that restrict nuclear power has been put together by the US government. The laws are, of course, often rightfully founded on safety and environmental precautions, but can additionally be built on political grounds. Public perception of nuclear power is often one of disdain, as I pointed out earlier. Even if these microreactors proved to be flawless, I believe that it would take years, or perhaps decades, to change the negative views held about nuclear energy and to remove redundant and irrelevant regulations. 

Conclusion

There is much research to perform and many obstacles to overcome if microreactors are ever able to become standardized. But it is so fascinating to me that a fuel that is so energetically dense, and simultaneously both safe and environmentally-friendly exists and may even power my future home. I'm very optimistic that further investigation could actually yield significant results.

Thanks for reading, if you made it this far! Here are some videos from Aalo, if you are interested: