That does not appear to be true. The BWRX-300 (the SMRs that we're building a bunch of) produces 300 MW of electricity from 870 MW of thermal power, which is about 35%, while a traditional reactor like the AP1000 produces 1,117 MW of electricity from 3,415 MW of thermal power, which is about 33%. So the SMRs we're building are more efficient than the most recent full-sized nuclear reactors that the US built.
The hope is that SMR will drive costs down farther in the future, these are the costs for the first one. The reason why Darlington's unit 1 (well, it's an existing nuclear plant, so the first of the SMR) is a bunch more expensive than units 2-4 is *because* it's the first, and then they've got a bunch of orders for elsewhere in Canada, and quite a few orders internationally. The hope is that serial production will drive the costs down a bunch, which will make them more attractive to buyers, which will help the cost more, and so on.
Solar's great, when it's viable, like in the southern US. It's not as viable here in Canada, not when day gets so much shorter in the winter, and the solar irradiance at solar noon is a lot less even in the summer. But even then, solar isn't ideal for base load. In order to account for really bad conditions over an extended period of time (many days of bad weather), you need a lot of extra storage. So you ultimately want a mix. Hydro. Nuclear. Wind. Solar. The more diversity the better. Here in Quebec, we're around 94% hydro and 5% wind. Ontario's about 55% nuclear, 25% hydro, and the rest a mix of gas/wind/solar.
Anyway, nuclear and hydro are really the only clean options that can provide reliable and consistent base load, and hydro is highly geography dependent, so that leaves nuclear.
The latest one is Vogtle's units 3 and 4, which are Westinghouse AP1000 units, which cost $36.8 billion USD for around 2.2 gigawatts of capacity.
However, recent and upcoming Canadian plants are relevant, because the US and Canada operate a shared electrical grid (excepting Quebec and Texas, and Quebec still has connections to the US and Canada). OPG is currently building GE Vernova Hitachi Nuclear Canada (what a mouthfull) BWRX-300 SMR reactors, with four of them expected to provide 1.2 gigawatts of capacity for $20.9 billion CAD (or $14.8 billion USD), and if we were to predict future costs by assuming future reactors cost the same as reactors 2-4 (as serial production) rather than reactor 1 (the first ever of its type), a similar project, four reactors plus shared infrastructure, would cost $19.2 billion CAD (or $13.6 billion USD). That is roughly two thirds the cost of the latest US reactor, per gigawatt.
Of course, the Darlington project is still fairly early on, and it's possible that costs will be over budget. However OPG does have a good track record in this regard, they recently completed a $12.8 billion nuclear refurbishment project that completed $150 million under budget and four months ahead of schedule.
They spent so long pushing hydrogen and pretending like battery electric wasn't going to happen. Now that they've finally given up on hydrogen, there's nowhere to go but up.
Surely the media would never exaggerate and sensationalize?!?!?
Sales are down. Yes, I'm sure the higher console prices aren't helping. Or the fact that we're so late in the generation. But sales aren't down by *that* much, and the game comes out in a month, and they've already sold 95 million PS5s. Selling a few hundred thousand less consoles, not all of whom would have bought the game anyway, isn't going to make that big of a difference in the game's sales. It's a small percentage difference in the number of total consoles sold. But a pirated copy of the PS5 game that runs on PC, when there isn't a native PC port? That would make a big difference.
Except console sales haven't nosedived. PS5 sales in August 2026 are around 72% what they were two years ago (so before the RAM crisis), which can just as easily be accounted for by the fact that the console launched six years ago, and they've already sold 95 million of them: we're very late in the generation. Even if sales were the same as two years ago, that wouldn't represent a very large percentage difference in the size of the install base by the time the game launches in November.
I wonder if they planned to do the PC port this soon, or if this is an urgent reaction to the rapid progress of PS5 emulators like AnyPS5. If they had released the PC port a year or two later like usual, there's a very real chance that PC players would be playing pirated copies of GTA6 on PC before the official release, hurting sales.
These were people who worked in defence so anywhere behind the Iron Curtain was right out and I imagine Cuba would have been too. Even Austria was considered a risk, probably because so many spies would hang out there from both sides.
Or so they told me. I can't be entirely sure they weren't exagerrating.
Yes, certain destinations were off-limits to people who chose to work in defense, however that falls far shy of this "Exit Ban".
The US saying "If you travel to Cuba, you may face charges when you return" or even "You have been charged with a specific crime, so you cannot leave until the charges are resolved is significantly different from China saying "You are important to our plans, so you cannot leave the country at all, and neither can your immediate family", or forbidden a US citizen from leaving because of visa inconsistencies, much less the common situation where Chinese employers require staff to surrender their passports.
Yes, a judge can require the defendant to surrender their passport as a condition of bail, but the USA lacks effective exit controls, so that isn't actually a high barrier to exiting (but makes it tough to come back).
If, as the article suggests, this is an "Exit Ban" on certain individuals and extending to their family members, that's significantly more restrictive than anything the US has imposed on defense workers and top scientists other than during wartime.
Yes, people with sensitive jobs and a security clearance are strongly discouraged from visiting hostile nations, with a subset even being required to submit their travel plans before any foreign travel, but this is explained clearly when you accept employment directly with the US government, or start working under a government contract, and you're always free to not accept the job offer. And yes, all US citizens were for many years prohibited to travel to embargoed nations (Cuba). But this was nowhere near an "exit ban" on key personnel, much less on their family members!
When I held a clearance, I was never forbidden to leave the USA. I might not have a job when I get back, but that's not the same thing at all.
Exactly. You can test each component on the ground like NASA does but it's very expensive and very slow. I think the "test flight hardware by flying it" philosophy practiced by SpaceX is superior for actually producing results in a timely and cost-efficient manner.
One result of this is that a single SLS engine probably costs more than an entire Starship/Super Heavy stack. Even the ones that were taken off Space Shuttles and refurbished.
Yep, even the "expendable" version (the RS-25E) is hugely expensive. From wiki:
On 1 May 2020, NASA awarded a contract extension to manufacture 18 additional RS-25 engines, with associated services, for $1.79 billion
So these engines are costing the taxpayer 100 million EACH, the 4 of them needed for an SLS booster is 400 million. And this is for the less-capable expendable version, which was supposed to be cheaper than the original. All to just manufacture an engine that has already been designed and has been optimized for decades, no research and development required. Meanwhile SpaceX is producing hundreds of Raptor engines, which they had to develop from scratch, and doing it at a much lower cost. As a bonus, the Raptor is a reusable engine so they don't need to make a new set for each rocket they need to fly (presuming their reuse plans come to fruition).
Holmes faked her demonstrator.
Don't think you can fake rockets. She's already launched one.
Has she? Which mission? I looked and can't find anything on the rocket she (or her company) launched, but maybe I'm just missing something.
When I try to go somewhere using Google Maps, it won't try to send me down the shortest route, it will try to send me down the *fastest* route. And what route is the fastest depends on traffic. This would naturally spread people out: as soon as the busy highway becomes congested, people automatically get sent down alternate routes instead of further congesting that highway.
Good timing. I bought my first BMW in 2007. I'm planning on a new M2 next year.
Sweet. You'll be able to look forward cool features such as forced ads on the in-car screens (https://tech.slashdot.org/story/26/08/06/0414254/bmw-blasts-its-cars-internal-screens-with-aggressive-ads) and paying a subscription for heated seats (https://tech.slashdot.org/story/22/07/12/1616236/bmw-starts-selling-heated-seat-subscriptions-for-18-a-month). No idea why you would want to continue with a company that does stuff like that, but it's your money. I prefer car companies that don't nickle and dime me (or try to sell my attention to other companies) after I've already bought the car.
They love security data that they control. Once they realize that cameras tell the world who loves kids most, cameras will be pointing at the birds.
Birds ARE the cameras: https://birdsarentreal.com/pag...
Wake up SHEEPLE!
You're the one who misused the word, don't get all offended. Just for reference:
discrete: [dih-skreet] / dskrit /
adjective
1. apart or detached from others; separate; distinct.
six discrete parts.
Synonyms:
unconnected, individual, different
2. consisting of or characterized by distinct or individual parts; discontinuous.
Here's the word it appears you were trying to use:
discreet:[dih-skreet] / dskrit /
adjective
1. judicious in one's conduct or speech, especially with regard to respecting privacy or maintaining silence about something of a delicate nature; prudent; circumspect.
Homophones are HARD, right?
Contemptuous lights flashed flashed across the computer's console. -- Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
