A new generation of clean energy is on the horizon

Oklo is a clean energy company that has focused on developing a product and service that people want to buy. In 2020, they made history by submitting, and having had the NRC accept, their combined license application for their Aurora powerhouse design.

Over the last couple of years, Oklo has also made notable strides on multiple fronts. They were approved to use a specific site on the Idaho National Laboratory campus to build their first unit. The arrangement includes the grant of a long term site use permit. An environmental assessment is already underway. //

Oklo is developing a “First of a kind” (FOAK) advanced energy system, which typically involves unusual costs and risks that can scare away investors. Yet, Oklo’s simple, safe and small reactor passively cools itself with a design that has already been well proven. They’ve based their modern implementation on the Experimental Breeder Reactor II (EBR-2), that ran for 30 years, providing a wealth of performance data that has helped the NRC regulator get comfortable with the design’s technical capabilities.

Thus, while some might think that Oklo’s first-ever 4th Gen application to the NRC might never be approved, the NRC accepted the application even though it was radically shorter than prior applications submitted for Gen III plants. Under the requirements of the Nuclear Energy Innovation and Modernization Act (NEIMA) the review process is expected to take three years, rather than four to complete. This means that Oklo should have an approved certification in the first half of 2023. //

Doug Coombes says

December 14, 2021 at 7:33 PM

“Oklo further recognized that the INL was storing waste from the EBR-II project and knew that this waste would be well suited to be the fuel for their reactor. They have secured an agreement with the INL to supply this waste and approval from the DOE to use it as fuel in their reactor.”

If it can be bred into fissile fuel like U-238 or Th-232 can or is already fissile like U-235, Pu-239 or other fissile TRUs, is it really waste?

There is a huge amount of fuel currently being stored as “waste” in the US, just waiting for reactors to be built that will burn it. Ed Pheil from Elysium estimates there is enough spent nuclear fuel to power their MCSFRs for 300 hundred years at current demand if they replaced ALL current US energy generation. It would be enough for over 1,000 years if it just replaced current US nuclear power generation.

That’s before we even look at the 470,000 tons of depleted uranium now being stored as “waste” in the US as uranium hexafluoride that can also be bred into fissile plutonium or added directly to the fuel cycle of some fast reactors now being developed.

The quicker we certify and start building these new designs the better.

Engineer-Poet says

December 15, 2021 at 1:34 PM

If it can be bred into fissile fuel like U-238 or Th-232 can or is already fissile like U-235, Pu-239 or other fissile TRUs, is it really waste?

Rhetorical question, I know, but if it was too depleted to be used any further in the EBR-II then it counted as “waste” for that purpose.

Elon Musk @elonmusk says the woke mind virus is "arguably one of the biggest threats to modern civilization." pic.twitter.com/JqLmb1Sqm8

— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) December 22, 2021 //

Wokeness basically wants to make comedy illegal, which is not cool. Trying to shut down Chappelle, come on man, that’s crazy. Do we want a humorless society that is simply rife with condemnation, and hate?”

He continued, “At its heart, wokeness is divisive, exclusionary, and hateful. It basically gives mean people a shield to be cruel, armored in false virtue.” //

@elonmusk On Twitter Battle With Senator Warren

"She called me a grifter & a free-loader who doesn't pay taxes basically & I'm literally paying the most tax that any individual in history has ever paid this year, ever. And she doesn't pay taxes basically at all." @TheBabylonBee pic.twitter.com/jQZzvhBVRr

— The Columbia Bugle 🇺🇸 (@ColumbiaBugle) December 22, 2021

“She struck first. Yes, she did actually call me a freeloader and a grifter who doesn’t pay taxes. I’m literally paying the most tax that any individual in history has ever paid this year, ever, and she doesn’t pay taxes, basically. And her taxes and salary is paid for by the taxpayer like me. If you could die by irony, she would be dead,” Musk said.

Last week, the Chicago-based Center for Tech and Civic Life finally filed its 2020 federal tax return and the list of grant recipients is shocking.

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg donated approximately $350 million to the formerly unknown liberal organization CTCL. The group then gave “grants” to local election offices, along with explicit instructions regarding how election procedures were to be changed. This greatly benefitted Democrat candidates.

Although hundreds of jurisdictions received tiny gifts of a few thousand dollars, which probably made no difference in their actions, a surprisingly large number of jurisdictions received multi-million dollar grants of these so-called “ZuckBucks.”

Having spent many hours reviewing CTCL’s tax information and speaking with researchers at the Capital Research Center and the Rodney Election Research Institute, I am now more convinced than ever that this unprecedented type of “election spending” by CTCL and Zuckerberg is a serious violation of the spirit of free and fair elections. I am unable to recall any comparable effort ever having been undertaken in the entire history of U.S. elections.

An integral part of any such system is that neither side gets to run the administration of the election. Neither candidate gets to design the rules. Election offices are supposed to be guided by the principle of neutrality, and both teams get to look over election officials’ shoulders to assure that neutrality.

The funding of election administration should be roughly equal on a per-capita basis, should be equally distributed to all election offices in a state, and must come from taxpayers. Neutrality in election administration, funding, and staffing must be paramount.

Election offices must never be subject to outside influences that might favor a particular candidate. Wealthy and powerful people should not be allowed to use their money to influence the manner of administering elections. There is too much potential for such financial influence to result in elections favoring the party of the wealthy and the powerful.