by Sally Sedgwick
With a national policy goal of eliminating coal fired plants, and a state mandate of producing completely carbon-free generation by 2040, how will energy needs be met?
“We cannot meet the power need with wind and solar,” explained Brad Dolinski, CEO of North Itasca Electric Cooperative. “We have to talk nuclear.”
According to the US. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, there are 95 nuclear power reactors licensed to operate in the country now, but the two Vogtle units commissioned last year in Georgia were the first to be constructed in over 30 years. Most operating units were constructed in the 1970s and 1980s and a lot has changed in design, safety and the industry.
Education about nuclear energy is needed, Dolinski realized, if people are to form an opinion on whether to support it, especially since legislation would be needed to reverse the existing moratorium in the state on nuclear power construction.
North Itasca Electric put together a panel of experts to speak to its membership at a meeting on Oct 22. Included were: Darrick Moe, CEO of the Minnesota Rural Electric Association; Mike Brasel , senior vice-president, Nuclear Product Solutions, Blue Wave AI Labs; Kyle Leir, manager of Resource Strategy and Development for Great River Energy; and Eric Palmer, manager of Utility Planning for Minnesota Power. State legislators Sen. Grant Hauschild and Rep. Spencer Igo also spoke to the audience.
Modern nuclear power
What is nuclear energy today? Brasel described one of the concepts for modern nuclear power, the small modular reactor (SMR), defined as a unit with output less than 300 MW (one MW will power about 500 homes). There are currently 80 different designs for SMRs, with 22 from the U.S. He said SMRs have already been placed in Russia, China and Argentina.
Constructed in a factory and moved to the site, an SMR costs less than a plant built onsite. Putting several units in one powerhouse also reduces the risk of losing a large generating source during an outage. Another concept is the microreactor with output from one to 10 MW.
Today 20% of the state power needs are met through its two operating baseload nuclear plants, Monticello and Prairie Island, pointed out Moe, both owned by Northern States Power (Xcel Energy). Power from those plants is carbon-free.
World-wide, nuclear plants are being built, and in the U.S. some states are reversing moratoriums, like Illinois. Nationally there is a lot of energy toward doing this, said Moe. One audience member pointed out that private companies are entering the market, with Microsoft planning to repower Three Mile Island to support its computing needs, and Bill Gates developing plants in Wyoming.
In planning, Lier noted that GRE looks at providing power that is affordable, reliable and sustainable. He believes that Minnesota is getting down to a tipping point on baseline energy where nuclear may be the only option.
For an overall view, Dolinski recommended the documentary Nuclear Now, available on streaming services.
Safety in design
Safety is built into current designs, said Brasel. A probabilistic risk assessment looks at every element in the plant with a risk standard of about one in 10-10 percent, like being struck by lightning.
New plant designs also use passive safety systems, which use gravity and natural circulation to cool the reactor core in case of failure, instead of traditional active systems which require electricity to run pumps.
Minnesota moratorium
Why can’t Minnesota just build a nuclear power plant? Minnesota has had a moratorium on building new nuclear plants since 1994, primarily due to concerns over disposal of spent fuel.
Originally the federal government agreed to accept all nuclear waste. But then its designated site, Yucca Mountain in Nevada, was shut down in the wake of public activism. Some private companies are developing storage options and reactor designs that use spent fuel, but little is being done on the federal level.
However, said Brasel, dry cask storage technology is mature and the amount of waste is limited so at this time, waste is stored on site. When the plant at Genoa, Wis. was decommissioned, for instance, the waste from 20 years of operation fit into 5 casks, each the size of a small silo.
Fuel availability
The panel said that the fuel, U235, an isotope of uranium is available from mines in Canada, with some also from the U.S. The ore is converted to uranium flouride gas at a plant in New Mexico, then enriched and turned into pellets at GE and Westinghouse facilities. Those pellets, about the size of a pencil eraser, are stacked into rods to be placed arrays in a reactor vessel. New plants can use pellets that are enriched to 5%.
There are reactors that can use other fuels, said Brasel, like thorium or plutonium.
What’s best for us?
How much power does North Itasca Electric need? North Itasca Electric is a small winter/nighttime peaking utility said Dolinski, where the system needs to handle large changes in demand.
He asked Kyle Leir, manager of GRE’s Resource Strategy and Development and Eric Palmer, manager of MP’s Utility Planning how they would design a system for the utility from the ground up.
“It’s a planner’s dream!” said Palmer, to start designing a system with a blank slate. First he would look at the end goal: is it to be carbon-free? Then he would optimize what was here in the area. For instance MP started with a 20-30 MW hydro plant and then built a baseload system with coal, later adding wind from the Dakotas and finally hydro from Canada.
Leir would plan for energy (like miles driven) and capacity (like vehicle size). He would use peaking plants where output can be moved up and down quickly with wind and natural gas as backup sources. Then he would consider nuclear for baseloading, pointing out that the plant could be built in an adjacent state. GRE’s planning, he said, follows the three requirements of affordable, reliable and sustainable.
How do managers responsible for a future generation mix handle a shifting political landscape? It’s not easy, indicated Palmer, to make recommendations for high dollar investments that will last 20 to 30 years. Minnesota Power looks for options that are win-win and technologies that are “future proof.” For instance, one natural gas plant is being designed so it can also use up to 30% hydrogen fuel or carbon capture technology.
Sen. Grant Hauschild assured the audience that he supports both green energy and nuclear power and believes that the state goals are unachievable without nuclear. He is working toward permitting reform and coordinating the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency and Department of Natural Resources reviews so that they arrive at the end of the review in agreement.
Rep. Spencer Igo is on the House Energy Committee, and has carried a bill since 2020 to abolish the moratorium. He said that legislators often get pressure from delegates from outside Minnesota on legislation based on their organizational priorities instead of Minnesota needs, like a recent carbon capture bill.
Hauschild pointed out that northern Minnesota needs fought an uphill battle, and encouraged those with friends or family in the metro area to speak to their legislators on our behalf.
An audience member from Arrowhead Cooperative, Cook County, pointed out that they were the furthest from any generating sources and would have to change their mission statement of providing safe, reliable and affordable energy if the questions on power supply were not solved.
