Russia and China are in full control of the nuclear energy markets as America is nearly 100% dependent on foreign suppliers of nuclear fuel, according to nuclear energy expert Ed McGinnis. Are we in danger of potential rolling brownouts?
Curio, a pioneer in nuclear waste recycling solutions, is pleased to announce it has recently established a memorandum of understanding with Sargent & Lundy, a global engineering and design firm with expertise in nuclear energy, to transform nuclear fuel recycling practices. This agreement sets the stage for exploring endeavors focused on the commercial deployment of Curio’s cutting-edge used nuclear fuel recycling facility and leveraging its groundbreaking NuCycle™ technology.
The collaboration between Curio and Sargent & Lundy represents a significant milestone in the advancement of sustainable nuclear energy solutions during the crucial scaling-up phases, including pilot and engineering-scale facilities, leading to the full-scale deployment of Curio’s revolutionary NuCycle facility.
Curio’s NuCycle technology, built on decades of American R&D, stands at the forefront of nuclear waste recycling innovation. The envisioned commercial-scale facility is set to achieve an unprecedented nuclear fuel recycling capacity capable of processing an impressive 4,000 metric tons per year – more than the entire world’s annual recycling capacity combined. Notably, this facility will incorporate state-of-the-art safeguards and security measures by design, ensuring the utmost safety and security throughout the recycling process.
Edward McGinnis, Chief Executive Officer of Curio, expressed his enthusiasm for the alliance stating, “We are extremely pleased to work with Sargent & Lundy, a leading force in nuclear energy engineering. This marks a significant step towards realizing our vision of a closed fuel cycle with state-of-the-art nuclear waste recycling technologies and processes. Together, we are committed to unleashing the full potential of the atom and powering the future with clean and sustainable energy solutions.”
“Our combined goal of making substantial advancements in nuclear energy recycling means immense potential for a greener future,” added Sargent & Lundy Chairman, President & CEO Victor Suchodolski. “Leveraging our proven expertise with Curio’s cutting-edge technology further solidifies our incessant drive for innovation – one of our fundamental core values. We’re excited at the prospect of setting new recycling standards that will transform nuclear waste into a nuclear asset.”
By dramatically reducing the amount of high-level radioactive material remaining after the recycling process, this collaboration holds the potential to reshape the nuclear energy landscape and play a crucial role in addressing pressing energy and environmental challenges.
About Curio:
Curio is dedicated to pioneering innovative nuclear waste recycling solutions and unlocking the full potential of the atom. From closing the fuel cycle to producing
proliferation-hardened alternative fuels for current and advanced reactors, Curio envisions a future powered by clean, sustainable, and carbon-free nuclear energy.
About Sargent & Lundy:
Since 1891, Sargent & Lundy has been bringing together the best people, ideas, and technical expertise to provide innovative engineering and design services to clients across the globe. Whether in the power and energy, gas distribution, industrial, or government sectors, the firm addresses its clients’ unique and changing needs with unparalleled service and quality.
Nuclear power is an underutilized form of energy production that is safe, reliable, and provides emissions-free electricity. It has potential to help provide much-needed affordable electricity to people all over the world. Unfortunately, it is also deeply misunderstood, and scare tactics and myths are prevalent.
In this latest edition of the Center for Energy, Climate, and Environment’s PowerCast, Daren Bakst, host of the PowerCast and Senior Research Fellow in Environmental Policy and Regulation, is joined by Ed McGinnis, former acting Assistant Secretary for the Office of Nuclear Energy at the Department of Energy, and currently CEO of CURIO™, and Jack Spencer, Senior Research Fellow, Energy and Environmental Policy at The Heritage Foundation, to discuss nuclear power, including its importance and challenges.
A growing number of experts are convinced that the transition to net zero carbon needs to involve greater use of nuclear power. But one of the problems with nuclear is what to do with the additional nuclear waste. Ed McGinnis, who heads startup CURIO™, has called the need to find acceptable solutions to nuclear waste “the largest ball and chain on the ankle of the US nuclear energy sector.”
CURIO™ has developed an innovative process for spent nuclear fuel recycling, called NuCycle™. This would turn nuclear waste into usable products, including fuel for advanced nuclear reactors, and isotopes that can be used for other functions, such as making power sources for space missions and tiny batteries. The company envisions its NuCycle™ facility to be the size of a football stadium and capable of recycling all of the US’s nuclear waste.
Thorium energy experts at the Thorium Energy Alliance Conference told The Epoch Times what they believe has limited the use of the mildly radioactive element, long touted as a potential alternative or complement to plutonium and enriched uranium in nuclear reactors.
Unlike uranium-235, the isotope in enriched uranium that sustains a nuclear chain reaction, thorium is fertile, not fissile. It must be bombarded with neutrons to produce a fissile isotope, uranium-233.
“We don’t have a practical way in this country to use thorium profitably in reactors that exist,” Mark Nelson, managing director of the consultancy Radiant Energy Group, said in an Oct. 13 interview with The Epoch Times. “We are unlikely to have it in the next 10 years unless we find a way to start licensing and building heavy-water reactors in this country, like Canada’s CANDU [Canadian Deuterium Uranium].”
Nuclear power can potentially help reduce the emissions associated with power generation. However, there are well known issues with nuclear – primarily its cost, the time to develop a nuclear power plant, and the highly radioactive waste it generates.
CURIO™ is a hugely ambitious company working to tackle two of these three problems.
I invited Ed McGinnis, CURIO™’s CEO to come on the podcast to tell me more. We had a cool conversation discussing the problems in the nuclear industry today, the innovative solutions CURIO™ has come up with to solve these problems, and the products CURIO™ are producing from the nuclear waste stream.
This was a truly fascinating episode of the podcast and I learned loads as always, and I hope you do too.
Ed McGinnis knows a lot about the nuclear waste problem in the United States. He worked in U.S. Department of Energy from 1991 to 2021 and dealt directly with the U.S. government’s failed effort to build a nuclear waste repository in Yucca Mountain, Nevada.
“I certainly have the tire tracks on my back” from trying to lead the United States to develop and execute a long-term storage plan for nuclear waste, McGinnis told CNBC in a phone conversation in June.
“Essentially, both parties have said it’s politically unworkable” to find a permanent solution, McGinnis told CNBC. “But during the meantime, we have a huge, huge unresolved problem representing pretty much the largest ball and chain on the ankle of the U.S. nuclear energy sector that’s trying to transition itself for the next generation of reactors.”
Former Assistant Secretary for the Office of Nuclear Energy Ed McGinnis spoke with Joe ‘Pags’ Pagliarulo Wednesday to discuss the safety, efficiency, and affordability of nuclear energy as an alternative to fossil fuels.
“A lot of people are talking about the positivity of nuclear energy. It sounds evil, until we talk about the energy side of it. Can you dispel any fear I might have when it comes to nuclear energy?” asked Pags.
“We’ve never had safer reactors in our history. They all go through enormous scrutiny,” said McGinnis.
“Chernobyl was an older design. We’ve learned a lot from those incidents. We’ve built new designs that have much more robust safety and security features. These are not your grandparents’ reactors,” he added.
Ed McGinnis is CEO of CURIO™ – a nuclear innovation and technology development company. A 30-year veteran of the Department of Energy, Ed previously served as Assistant Secretary of the Office of Nuclear Energy (Acting) and Executive Director of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.
The United States is at its best when it leads, setting the standard for the rest of the world while doing so. Whether it be independence in thinking, independence in manufacturing bases, independence in energy production, or independence in agriculture, these attributes (and more) established the U.S. as a stabilizer in the rules-based global community. With that said, America’s independence, which is vital to our economy, workforce and national interests, has dangerously eroded. Case in point, our leadership and independence in overall U.S. production. As U.S. production erodes, so does global security. The adverse effects of overreliance on foreign supply chains have led to inflation, economic instability, and frankly even a challenge to America’s stature as a global supplier and the global market’s stability.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is the latest example of challenges to the current global market and supply chain infrastructure as well as a major challenge to the very models of independence – inspired and modeled in so many ways after the U.S. It is also a jarring reminder of the risks associated with depending on foreign adversaries for critical resources and energy.