There’s a segment of the New Hampshire legislature that loves the idea of “small modular” nuclear reactions – the dream of techbros who love silver bullet solutions to big problems as long as they’re technically cutting edge and don’t involve nasty things like social change.
That’s why we have NH HCR2, a concurrent resolution that says “advanced nuclear energy technology to be in the best interest of the state of New Hampshire and the United States” while urging other people to pay for its development, as well as HB710, which says utilities can own “small modular” nukes if they ever actually exist.
Both bills seem likely to become law but unlikely to do much if anything.
Actually, that’s not quite true. That last bill includes a good solar provision, raising the annual cap for low- to moderate-income community solar projects from 6 to 18 megawatts. That could actually make a difference.
As you may have noticed, I am skeptical that nuclear reactions will ever generate power cheaply enough to be worth pursuing despite the hope from the words small and modular. I will be happy to be proven wrong, but mostly I think this is just a distraction from the real engine of the energy transmission: solar, wind and storage.
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