U.S. Senate Weighs Big Plans for Small Reactors The ADVANCE Act could give nuclear SMR developers more than a few advancements.

In an article by IEEE Spectrum, Rahul Rao shared on 14 Apr 2023 of U.S. Senate’s ADVANCE Act, “a bill containing a package of nuclear reforms.”

In the U.S., SMR designers, operators, and fuel suppliers must all pass the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), the U.S. government’s nuclear arbiter.

Unfortunately, SMRs don’t fit neatly into the NRC’s aged regulatory scheme, one built for old and established large reactors. That’s at least part of the reason why, on 3 April, a bipartisan group of U.S. senators unveiled the ADVANCE Act, a bill containing a package of nuclear reforms.

“What the ADVANCE Act is saying is: ‘Okay, we’ve got an industry that’s really interested. We’ve got a lot of companies that are in progress. What are the things that we can do to even further accelerate that?’” says Patrick White, an analyst at the Nuclear Innovation Alliance (NIA), a nuclear power think tank.

For one, applicants today must pay around $300 for each hour of the NRC’s time… The act would also establish prizes. “Those prizes involve the first [developers] going through the different regulatory frameworks that the NRC has,” says Erik Cothron, an analyst at the Nuclear Innovation Alliance (NIA).

For more information on the IEE Spectrum article, the link is referenced here. Ref: https://spectrum.ieee.org/small-modular-reactors-advance-act

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