In the wake of Texas’s power grid failures caused by extreme weather events and a record-breaking demand for electricity, the state faces a growing need to re-visualize its energy future.
But as Texas began its search for solutions to strengthen and diversify its energy supply, a newer and more refined version of nuclear energy has emerged as a promising option in the form of small modular reactors (SMRs).
With recent advancements in this technology, SMR development offers a glimpse into a future where nuclear energy becomes more accessible and cost-effective, delivering the same powerful benefits as traditional reactors but on a far smaller, more efficient and more manageable scale.
“The main advantage of nuclear power is cost per volume,” nuclear engineer Taylor Hinson said. “The amount of power that is needed, estimated per person, from nuclear for your entire life can fit into a Coke can, as opposed to truckloads of coal or the land use for the other options.”
Yet despite nuclear energy’s promise, backed by renewed momentum in its development, Texas still leans heavily on wind and natural gas, which generate two-thirds of all electricity that powers Texas’s power grid.
According to Jose L. Lage, a Professor of Mechanical Engineering at SMU, this dependence on these methods has led to an energy landscape lacking long-term sustainability.
“Solar and wind energy are not reliable,” Lage said. “With natural gas, you have the limitations of carbon-based fuel. Coal is bad, as the technology is old, and it pollutes a lot. At the end of the day, nuclear power is the best alternative.”
However, nuclear power does have its own challenges — ones that have stalled its expansion for decades. Although its benefits seem appealing, especially in contrast to the older and more traditional methods, its growth remains limited by the steep costs and lengthy timelines required to build and implement new nuclear power plants.
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) and World Nuclear Association, the cost of new nuclear plants is over six times that of natural gas plants and takes nearly three times as long to construct — several key reasons behind Texas having fewer nuclear plants compared to its natural gas facilities.
But if SMRs become commercially viable, their significantly lower construction costs — nearly half that of traditional nuclear power plants — coupled with shorter build times, are poised to offer a compelling alternative to conventional nuclear energy.
“The model is pretty much a Lego type of design,” Lage said. “It shortens the construction period, because instead of every time you want to build a power plant you have to go through a whole entire process, if I have some parts of the power plant that have already been designed, built and approved, and as long as I use exactly the same design and build in exactly the same way, the certification process is much shorter.”
On the more technical side, SMRs also introduce innovative approaches to optimizing fuel efficiency and improving nuclear waste management.
“They should be able to help us recycle spent fuel because they will use a lower enrichment or lower power, but they can also be used to use a higher enriched fuel at a lower concentration, requiring fewer assemblies,” Hinson said. “So it’s kind of a win-win.”
While Hinson acknowledges the promise of more advanced nuclear technology he also recognizes that public opinion poses a large obstacle to future investments. However, he also emphasizes that reactors have extensive safety measures and backup systems in place, mitigating risk and ensuring that they remain one of the safest energy sources available.
“The public fears what they don’t know,” Hinson said. “And the public doesn’t really know about nuclear power. They don’t realize that there are numerous fail-safes put in place. There are backups on backups on backups. Public perception is a very large deterrent for increasing or moving forward with nuclear power production.”
But the growing interest in SMRs in the Texas energy industry signals a shift in how nuclear energy is viewed.
Specifically, four leading companies in nuclear energy generation have recently partnered with Texas A&M and ERCOT to focus on developing SMRs on the A&M-RELLIS campus, a state-sponsored project that can become active as early as 2030.
And as more companies start to invest more money in the nuclear sector in anticipation of these advancements, the growing momentum has the potential to permanently transform Texas’s energy landscape.
“People are talking about putting these reactors in West Texas as a support mechanism to generate electricity and allow the development of that region as projected,” Lage said. “Texas wants to spread out a little bit to propel the state’s development. And so the SMRs would be one thing that will have a tremendous impact if they’re done. And if everything goes well, I would be surprised if in three or five years, we don’t already have a good chunk of electricity being generated by SMRs in Texas.”
Ultimately, with the growing energy demands in Texas and the ever-increasing appeal to SMRs as a cheaper and more manageable alternative to traditional nuclear power plants, the state may soon find itself at the center of a nuclear revolution.
“The world runs on electricity,” Hinson said. “You have to have electricity, and you have to find a way to make it. And they’re realizing that nuclear power is going to be a part of the future, whether people like it or not.”
