
Westinghouse Files for Bankruptcy, in Blow to Nuclear Power - mathoff
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/29/business/westinghouse-toshiba-nuclear-bankruptcy.html
======
killjoywashere
The real concern here is making sure the existing nuclear plants have a clear
glide slope toward end-of-life. Nuclear power is an extremely tight community.
On the nuclear carrier I was on (powered by Westinghouse plants), there was a
valve (a valve!) malfunctioning and the tech rep flown out from the company
took one look at it and said "This bit's in backward". "How do you know?" "I
designed it". Which means the same guy had been working on that system for 30
years.

The people working for this company are a matter of national security. I sure
hope Secretary Mattis understands that.

This, also, by the way, is a great illustration of Elon Musk's contention that
these technologies don't just keep working. Brilliant, competent engineers and
scientists have to invest themselves in making them work.

~~~
MichaelApproved
> "This bit's in backward"

This is why I'm against nuclear power. As safe as the technology _could_ be,
it still run by humans who make errors.

If you think a bit being put in backwards isn't a big deal, check out the
history of San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.

> The San Onofre station had technical problems over the years. In July 1982,
> Time wrote, "The firm Bechtel was ... embarrassed in 1977, when it installed
> a 420-ton nuclear-reactor vessel backwards" at San Onofre.

Backwards. The reactor was installed backwards.

It goes on.

> In 2008, the San Onofre plant received multiple citations over issues such
> as failed emergency generators, improperly wired batteries and falsified
> fire safety data. In its annual review of 2011, the Nuclear Regulatory
> Commission (NRC) identified improvements but noted that in the area of human
> performance, "corrective actions to date have not resulted in sustained and
> measurable improvement”.

Source:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Onofre_Nuclear_Generating_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Onofre_Nuclear_Generating_Station)

~~~
avar
Being against nuclear for trivial reasons like these is why we have the
alternative: coal plants. Those kill an estimated 300,000 thousand people per
year[1].

It's only recently that renewables have become a realistic alternative in some
(but not all) cases, but for decades we've had people dropping like flies due
to coal, entirely because the public is too science illiterate to understand
that nuclear isn't anywhere as big of a deal by comparison.

1\.
[https://sites.google.com/site/yarravalleyclimateactiongroup/...](https://sites.google.com/site/yarravalleyclimateactiongroup/pollution-
deaths-from-fossil-fuel-based-power-plants)

~~~
MichaelApproved
> the public is too science illiterate to understand that nuclear isn't
> anywhere as big of a deal by comparison.

Science illiteracy has nothing to do with it. The industry has a history of
non-trivial reasons for mistrust.

Regarding coal plant deaths, I'm not in favor of coal either. The sooner we
can move away from fossil the better.

~~~
avar
Yes it is science illiteracy. It's being blind to a much larger diffuse harm
in the face of some concentrated but much smaller harm.

It's arguably the most harmful kind of science illiteracy because it has the
biggest impact on public policy. Everything from people opposing mandatory
seat belt laws, to being overly concerned about e.g. genetically modified food
or cell phone tower radiation.

I'm sure you mean well, but really, people who hold exactly the opinion you
hold are in the aggregate _the_ reason for literally millions of deaths that
didn't need to happen worldwide since WWII.

We had all the data to indicate that burning fossil fuels was causing massive
diffuse harm, nuclear was realistically the only alternative in most cases,
but people didn't go for it because they were afraid, even though all the
science showed that there was little to worry about in comparison to what we
were already doing.

Sure someone installed a reactor backwards, but how are minor incidents like
these at all relevant compared to literally tens to hundreds of thousands of
deaths per year because we keep using the alternative?

~~~
theseatoms
And you're not even counting the lives saved from increased wealth due to
cheaper electricity.

------
freehunter
I find the headline weird, "a blow to nuclear power". I feel like nuclear
power is possibly the most attacked form of energy that exists, and that
includes coal and petroleum, both of which are still heavily used despite any
public outcry. Westinghouse has made some bad deals, sure, but the real "blow
to nuclear power" has been the massive refusal by both citizens and
governments to build new plants, and the few notable failures by plant
operators to maintain safe operation.

Of course the company that builds nuclear plants can't succeed if new plants
aren't being built. Westinghouse going under isn't going to destroy nuclear
power, nuclear power was already dead.

~~~
dalyons
After reading years and years of discussions like this, it seems like the
citizen opposition and (somewhat unfair) demonisation of nuclear power is
endlessly repeated as the reason we don't have nukes anymore, despite them
being a great source of clean(ish) energy.

However it seems the real reason, as in all things, is economics. They're just
too damn expensive to build and run, and the expected returns on investment
take an extremely long time to materialise(20+ years) Noone wants to put up
the enormous capital, with the very real risk that they'll never see returns
as the alternative energy markets(gas, solar, etc) are evolving and dropping
in price so quickly. I know I'd be pretty hesitant taking a half billion
dollar 30 year bet against technology.

~~~
hackuser
> it seems the real reason, as in all things, is economics

The economics might be different if we paid for the real cost of carbon-based
energy, instead of imposing that cost on the world as an externality.

~~~
kpil
The total cost for storing and securing shit for 100.000 years is also
'externalized.'

Both costs are more or less impossible to establish upfront.

~~~
opo
Right now waste can and should be recycled which would reduce the amount of
waste.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_waste](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_waste)

Soon it will be possible to use most of the waste as fuel:

"...Fast reactors can "burn" long lasting nuclear transuranic waste (TRU)
waste components (actinides: reactor-grade plutonium and minor actinides),
turning liabilities into assets. Another major waste component, fission
products (FP), would stabilize at a lower level of radioactivity than the
original natural uranium ore it was attained from in two to four centuries,
rather than tens of thousands of years"

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integral_fast_reactor](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integral_fast_reactor)

How does coal waste compare to that?

"Coal ash – the waste material left after coal is burned – contains arsenic,
mercury, lead, and over a dozen other heavy metals, many of them toxic."

[http://www.psr.org/environment-and-health/code-black/coal-
as...](http://www.psr.org/environment-and-health/code-black/coal-ash-toxic-
and-leaking.html)

"The study found that levels of radioactivity in the ash were up to five times
higher than in normal soil,"

[https://phys.org/news/2015-09-radioactive-contaminants-
coal-...](https://phys.org/news/2015-09-radioactive-contaminants-coal-
ash.html)

How much coal waste is produced per year?

"According to the American Coal Ash Association's Coal Combustion Product
Production & Use Survey Report, nearly 130 million tons of coal ash was
generated in 2014."

[https://www.epa.gov/coalash/coal-ash-
basics#03](https://www.epa.gov/coalash/coal-ash-basics#03)

~~~
luca_ing
The remnants of decommissioned reactors can't be recycled though.

There will be literal mountains of moderately to highly dangerous rubble.

~~~
opo
No, anything that has residual radiation will be entombed in clay/rock/etc.
The total amount of material and radiation from this will be trivial compared
to coal waste.

"...Nearly every major river in the Southeast has one or more unlined, leaking
pits on its banks filled with water and holding coal ash from power plants.
Containing millions of tons of toxin-laden waste, these pits are unlined and
have leaked arsenic, mercury, thallium, selenium, and other contaminants into
the rivers and the underlying groundwater for decades. "

[https://www.southernenvironment.org/cases-and-
projects/coal-...](https://www.southernenvironment.org/cases-and-
projects/coal-waste)

~~~
luca_ing
> No, anything that has residual radiation will be entombed in clay/rock/etc

Fine, it'll be an underground mountain :-)

> [...]compared to coal waste[...]Containing millions of tons of toxin-laden
> waste[...]

Holy shit, I had never even considered ash. It just never crossed my mind
somehow. Thanks for bringing this to my attention.

It doesn't make me any less opposed to nuclear energy, but you've given me one
more reason to be against coal plants (as if there weren't enough already).

------
barkingcat
There was massive financial fraud at Westinghouse. Even though the nuclear
industry is in a downturn, the troubles at Westinghouse are self inflicted -
Toshiba bought them, but found out almost all of the unit's profits are
misreported, leading to them spending money on "nothing" basically. The unit
earned no money and was threatening to sink Toshiba the entire keiretsu. This
is Toshiba trying to save itself by closing down the tide of red.

The source of the troubles was Westinghouse's purchase of CB&I Stone &
Webster, and it spun out of control.

~~~
thrillgore
I just don't think Japanese companies have a process on dealing with foreign
M&As and fraud mitigation. When Hitachi acquired the spanish manufacturing
company AnsaldoBreda, there were similar fraud accusations.

~~~
jessaustin
Sony's acquisition of Columbia/TriStar hasn't gone particularly well either...

~~~
thrillgore
I don't know if that's fraud as much as they just aren't using that business
right. Sony is weird, having an entertainment division they keep writing off
when their only profitable consumer products division is PlayStation.

~~~
jessaustin
It may not have been _fraud_ fraud, but they paid $4.8B and wrote off $2.7B of
that within five years. Somebody didn't know exactly what he was buying...

------
thewhitetulip
As a Nikola Tesla fan, just a honorary mention, Westinghouse corporation is
(one of) the (main) reason why we have AC. When nobody believed in Tesla,
George did, even after the bullying by the Edison camp, the smear campaigns. I
have read that per watt of AC current, Nikola Tesla was supposed to get some
$2.3, but Westinghouse told Tesla that he would be bankrupt if Tesla was to be
given that Royalty, the legend has it that Telsa tore the contract saying
something like this, "You believed in me when the world didn't, I don't want
the money", even if he didn't say something fancy during this time, but the
act in itself, if it really happened, is touching. I nearly cried when I read
it in a book a long long time ago.

It is sad to see that a energy giant is going bankrupt. End of an era for a
Tesla fan, the company who believed in Tesla is going bankrupt.

------
maxfurman
This is terrible news. Nuclear power, while not perfect, is one of the best
alternatives we have to carbon-emitting power plants. If there are no
companies left to build them, the already impossible task of fighting climate
change will get that much harder.

~~~
cookiecaper
I'd much rather deal with fossil fuels than the catastrophic risks uniquely
posed by nuclear power generation.

The excuse for incidents like Fukushima are "Well, they made these
mistakes...". Personally, I'd rather not risk zero-notice forced evacuations,
permanent quarantine zones, and making significant portions of populated land
uninhabitable for centuries on some people not making mistakes.

For those who write this off, there are some very tragic photo essays from
Pripyat and Fukushima that can make this impact feel very real. Do you want to
risk that happening to your area?

~~~
faet
>Do you want to risk that happening to your area?

Already do. 55% of my state's power comes from Nuclear.

Coal releases 100x more radiation and 68x more CO2 than nuclear for equal
energy production.
[http://science.sciencemag.org/content/202/4372/1045](http://science.sciencemag.org/content/202/4372/1045)

And it isn't like coal is immune from having zero-notice forced evacuation,
and making land uninhabitable.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_Fossil_Plant_coal_fly...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_Fossil_Plant_coal_fly_ash_slurry_spill)

~~~
fnj
That comparison is based on _properly functioning_ nuclear power plants and
coal. I daresay when you throw in the Chernobyl and Fukushima disasters, the
balance shifts dramatically in the opposite direction. Also, the radiation
from nuclear disasters is highly concentrated, while that from coal is
distributed at far lower concentrations.

~~~
opo
No, even including Chernobyl (an inherently dangerous design that would have
been illegal to build anywhere except the Soviet Union) nuclear has been far,
far safer than coal. As mikeash pointed out in another comment, "Put another
way: coal kills about as many people each year as nuclear has in its entire
history if you include the bombs dropped on Japan."

>...Also, the radiation from nuclear disasters is highly concentrated, while
that from coal is distributed at far lower concentrations.

The radiation emissions from a properly working coal plant are high enough
that the plant would be shut down if the NRC regulated coal plants. But the
real danger from coal plants is the massive amounts of CO2 that they emit
which is one of the biggest contributors to climate change that might end up
destroying our future. It is pretty obvious which power source is more
dangerous.

------
moomin
A difficulty I've always had with nuclear power is the problem of clean-up.
I'm not scaremongering and saying it's impossible, but it is inarguably
expensive. Having a large amount of costs after all the revenue has gone away
is a huge regulatory red flag: it's simpler to just structure things so that
you won't have to pay.

This problem applies to mining as well, but very little mining has to occur
near residential areas.

~~~
scubaguy
Do you have data that backs that cleanup is inarguably expensive? This
article, which more concrete, suggests 5% of revenue is required to be saved.

[http://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/nuclear-
fue...](http://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/nuclear-fuel-
cycle/nuclear-wastes/radioactive-waste-management.aspx#ECSArticleLink8)

~~~
cmurf
Whatever estimates the nuclear power industry made in Germany, they're argued
to be insufficient, so they're capping the upper liability limit for these
companies. The government's own stress testing suggests there will be a
shortfall that'll ultimately be picked up by taxpayers.
[https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news/german-utilities-buy-
ou...](https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news/german-utilities-buy-out-nuclear-
waste-liability-236-bln-euros)

------
erikig
Chapter 11 bankruptcy might be a the best thing for a critical company like
Westinghouse. Unlike Chapter 7 the operations continue but the entity gets
debt relief.

"In Chapter 11, in most instances the debtor remains in control of its
business operations as a debtor in possession, and is subject to the oversight
and jurisdiction of the court." [1]

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chapter_11,_Title_11,_United_S...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chapter_11,_Title_11,_United_States_Code)

~~~
greglindahl
I'm sure you read the article, which indicated that Chapter 11 is what's being
used. In the US, companies always go for Chapter 11 if it looks like it's
going to work, i.e. that there's a viable business in there somewhere. In
Westinghouse's case, the viable business is everything other than their
civilian reactor construction business.

------
nabla9
Westinghouse had severe technical problems with AP1000 and it's not alone.
French nuclear reactor builder Areva was restructured after they could not get
their new EPR reactors ready on time. Their flagship project Olkiluoto 3 is
nine years late and several billions of euros over budget.

Chinese are building reactors as fast as they can. They are buying reactors
designs from all main manufacturers. There are 21 reactors under construction
and they are three years late on average because manufacturers can't get these
next generation reactors ready.

Nuclear reactors being constantly late and exceeding their budgets is not new.
This was true in 60's and 70's and it's true now.

~~~
tonyedgecombe
Calder Hall in the UK was only three weeks late, opening in 1956. I wonder why
we find it more difficult now, is it more thorough standards perhaps?

~~~
nabla9
First Magnox reactors had very low efficiency < 20% and their electricity
production was not competitive. Their main use was to produce plutonium for
weapons.

------
jartelt
The nuclear industry was already having big issues, so I do not see this
bankruptcy changing things much. The decline of nuclear wasn't even related to
safety concerns, which I believe are largely exaggerated. Currently operating
nuclear plants are losing money and needed to be bailed out in Illinois and
New York because they cannot produce power for a low enough price. With that
in mind, who wants to spend >$1B to build a new nuclear plant that will likely
take >10 years to get permitted and built? For the industry to grow, there
needs to be a big change in technology to decrease the capital costs needed to
build plants and to decrease plant operating costs. If you cost more than a
natural gas plant, you are not going to have much luck in today's market.

------
Stratoscope
When I was a kid, my most favorite plastic model kit was the Westinghouse
Atomic Power Plant. It was awesome!

[http://www.oldmodelkits.com/index.php?detail=15662](http://www.oldmodelkits.com/index.php?detail=15662)

You can even buy one today for the low price of $1250:

[http://www.ebay.com/itm/262902080871](http://www.ebay.com/itm/262902080871)

------
mathattack
Bankruptcy doesn't mean closure. Someone will bring them out of bankruptcy,
but a lot of their existing creditors (and their existing owner) will get
stiffed along the way. Most airlines that went backrupt didn't disappear, but
their owners took a haircut.

------
caminante
Without getting into mismanagement or environmental concerns, nuclear's
economics continue to worsen.

1\. The supply of nuclear expertise and trained professionals is shrinking.
Thus, nuclear EPC + O&M goes up. This article cites this factor at least 3x in
different paragraphs. Though, that's great news for current nukes!

2\. LCOE (EPC + O&M) forecasts show nuclear on par with substitutes. I'm not
taking on the ESG risks of nuclear to achieve price parity.

------
mikikian
Here's the declaration by Lisa J. Donahue, Managing Director and the Leader of
the Global Turnaround and Restructuring Group at AlixPartners LLC, describing
the circumstances leading up to the bankruptcy [1].

[1]
[https://pdf.inforuptcy.com/pacer/nysbke/273388/dockets/4/1-C...](https://pdf.inforuptcy.com/pacer/nysbke/273388/dockets/4/1-C72B395A-148B-11E7-8158-F0759EBC7B2E)

------
DrNuke
West badly needs not surrendering Gen IV development & commercialisation to
Russia and China, for geopolitics reasons and Pu stockpile re-use.
Westinghouse is a chip here, a prestigious one for sure, and Gov should step
in. Time to drop the energy free-market drivel and act as a superpower in a
world that is dangerously going towards aggressive local superpowers. Risk!
game scenarios again.

------
wonderous
@Dang (HN "meta" Q&A)

Has HN ever looked into clustering news using Google News to do it?

Reason I ask is how HN's de-dup filter works is puzzling to me and related
stories would likely be useful to pool comments/de-dup/etc on a single news
event.

Example of dups, clusters, themes on HN on this event:
[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=westinghouse&sort=byDate&prefi...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=westinghouse&sort=byDate&prefix=false&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story)

Google News cluster:
[https://news.google.com/news/m/more?ncl=dGww1eRZGqsOScMMCg3U...](https://news.google.com/news/m/more?ncl=dGww1eRZGqsOScMMCg3U3tq_4ODEM&authuser=0&ned=us&topic=b)

~~~
striking
The de-dupe filter is based on how much discussion went on in past posts. But
that actually doesn't affect the current case we're looking at here, as there
are no duplicates of this link:
[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=https:%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=https:%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2017%2F03%2F29%2Fbusiness%2Fwestinghouse-
toshiba-nuclear-
bankruptcy.html&sort=byDate&prefix=false&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story)

Now, in a sense, there _was_ a duplicate, but because the URL didn't match, it
didn't count.
[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=https:%2F%2F*.nytimes.com%2F20...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=https:%2F%2F*.nytimes.com%2F2017%2F03%2F29%2Fbusiness%2Fwestinghouse-
toshiba-nuclear-
bankruptcy.html&sort=byDate&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story) The de-
dupe filter would've turned new submissions of your post into votes for your
post, if it had caught the duplicate.

That being said, I don't think HN is designed to pool discussion over time,
preferring to archive discussion of each story. At this point, you can't even
upvote older posts; they can only be added to your favorites.

~~~
wonderous
Yes the URL is different, but the canonical URL is the same.

 __Not concerned about the votes, just curious if the topic of canonical URLs,
clusters, etc. had come up.

~~~
striking
You raise an interesting point. I'd recommend shooting the HN team an email
about making use of canonical URLs for de-duping. mailto:hn@ycombinator.com

~~~
wonderous
Thanks. I'm aware of the HN support email, not interested in private dialogs;
whole topic of being open, accessible, referenable, etc. is a different topic,
and not something I'm looking to cover in the thread unless it's requested.

------
nbanks
The two new Westinghouse Vogtle pants are too expensive, at $14 billion for
2.5GW of power. If you purchased $14 billion of Tesla powerpacks, you could
get 35GWh of storage--enough storage to supply 2.5GW of power for 14 hours....

~~~
mikeyouse
The latest estimates are over $21 billion when you include financing costs.
They go out of their way to hide these numbers since $10k/KW is just insanely,
idiotically expensive.

------
squozzer
Keep in mind this financial debacle occurred in spite of at least one state's
electricity customers paying for nuclear plant construction in advance:

[http://www.ajc.com/business/psc-approves-georgia-power-
rate-...](http://www.ajc.com/business/psc-approves-georgia-power-rate-
increase/nTuA6IAdHMNWnca6hgkPKN/)

"January 2013: $1.05, third part of the three-tiered rate increase; 31-cent
increase for energy-efficiency programs; 85-cent increase for Plant Vogtle

Note: Figures are amounts added or reduced on a typical monthly bill based on
usage of 1,000 kilowatt hours"

------
ehnto
There is a fantastic documentary on the namesake of Westinghouse and the
company itself. I found it incredibly interesting! They go into topics such as
his relationship with other inventors at the time and his perhaps
philanthropic relationship with his workers, the different cycles of the
company and it's various product pivots.

[https://youtube.com/watch?v=8BUpF__h-
IY](https://youtube.com/watch?v=8BUpF__h-IY)

------
jiggliemon
July 7th, 1888: Tesla Sells A.C. Patents

Tesla sells patents for A.C. Polyphase System to George Westinghouse for
$25,000 in cash, $50,000 in notes and a royalty of $2.50 per horsepower for
each motor.

[https://teslauniverse.com/nikola-
tesla/timeline/1888-tesla-s...](https://teslauniverse.com/nikola-
tesla/timeline/1888-tesla-sells-ac-patents)

Some tangential history regarding Westinghouse for fun.

------
Animats
Does this mean the AP-1000 reactor is dead? Several of those are under
construction.

~~~
erikig
No, it just means Westinghouse is going to get its debt restructured. They'll
still keep operating under supervision of a bankruptcy judge.

------
zollidia
I honestly have nothing to add - most of the points I want to bring up are
already discussed in the comments.

But to those are actively working in a US Reactor Complex - you're working the
dream I hope to achieve one day. Good job.

------
cpr
Apropos of nuke subs and carriers, the thing that always blew my mind was
learning later in life that they're only fueled once for their working life
time...

------
danans
Was/Is Westinghouse doing anything with smaller scale reactor technologies
(Thorium,etc). If not, does this potentially open a door for those
technologies?

~~~
nbanks
Westinghouse is likely too large a company to experiment--probably a smaller
company will be first. Perhaps Terrestrial Energy in Canada will get their
molten salt reactor to work. In Russia, the Akademik Lomonosov, a nuclear
barge, will replace the power plant in Bilibino Nuclear Power plant in a
couple years. This qualifies as a small reactor.

------
smaili
Is this the same Westinghouse that produces microwaves?

~~~
pg_bot
The appliance division of Westinghouse was sold off in the 70's and is now
managed by Electrolux. This division of Westinghouse was spun off in the late
90's and is now owned by Toshiba. The history and scope of Westinghouse is
super interesting/confusing you can read the full details here.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westinghouse_Electric_Corporat...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westinghouse_Electric_Corporation)

Its current incarnation is now CBS corporation which licenses out the
Westinghouse name to other corporations.

------
seanmcdirmid
My dad worked for Westinghouse in the late 70s at Hanford. This really feels
like an end of an era.

~~~
tomjen3
I'm sure it does, but doesn't Westinghouse go way back, to the start of the
electric era? Didn't they built it, or lease most of it?

~~~
seanmcdirmid
Yes, but somehow the name today only survives for their nuclear operation:

> Westinghouse purchased CBS in 1995 and became CBS Corporation in 1997. In
> 1998, CBS established a brand licensing subsidiary Westinghouse Licensing
> Corporation (Westinghouse Electric Corporation). In 1997/1998 the Power
> Generation Business Unit, headquartered in Orlando, FL, was sold to Siemens
> AG, of Germany. A year later, CBS sold all of its nuclear power businesses
> to British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL). Soon after, BNFL gained license
> rights on the Westinghouse trademarks and they used those to reorganize
> their acquired assets as Westinghouse Electric Company. That company was
> sold to Toshiba in 2007.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westinghouse_Electric_Corporat...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westinghouse_Electric_Corporation#Timeline_of_company_evolution)

My dad was always in nuclear though (well, after a brief stint at Tektronix).

------
luckyduck13
My grandpa worked for Westinghouse as an electrical engineer. This news really
bums me out.

------
brilliantcode
I believe the nuclear power industry largely started out as a way to justify
world's largest nuclear warhead stockpile. I believe it was on a show from
Netflix that discussed the history of nuclear power. It worked remarkably
well.

~~~
jessaustin
Yeah the marketing worked so well you can still read it on HN from well-
informed nuke fans, even those who would deny being militarists.

~~~
fnordfnordfnord
I'm definitely a nuclear power proponent, and not a militarist, and I think
that the militaristic-ly driven decision to prefer the uranium fuel "cycle"
exclusively is the reason we're stuck with these shitty BWR's and PWR's, to
the exclusion of anything else. Nuclear as it exists today definitely doesn't
live up to the hype, and that's because the nuclear power industry is
essentially frozen on 1960's designs, with incremental improvements tacked on.
If the auto industry were as slow as the nuclear industry, we'd all be looking
forward to next year's new Ford Model C.

------
cowardlydragon
I have no industry wide view, but...

All existing nuclear powerplants are shitty Fukushima-style pressurized light
water reactors in the US, are they not?

I'd have to think this company is an incumbent blocking entry of modern
designs. Is this really a bad thing?

------
anovikov
Why should we be worried? Nuclear power is a no go for civilized world. It is
not insurable. It has well-developed, clean alternatives. Apart from carriers
and subs, it has no good applications (it would be also be great to get back
to nuclear missile cruisers and ideally even destroyers, but outside of the
military, i can't see any use for it at all).

