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£oii£-q3/t></7S~- MIT-ANP-CP-002 o PROCEEDINGS OF THE 0 w§r 2nd MIT INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE' ON THE NEXT GENERATION OF NUCLEAR POWER TECHNOLOGY October 25-26,1993 Massachusetts Institute of Technology ITEI Cambridge, MA 02139-4307 Sponsored by The Program for Advanced Nuclear Power Studies Professor Michael W. Golay, Chairman 1SUTI0N OF THIS DOCUMENT IS UNLIMITED DISCLAIMER This report was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States Government. Neither the United States Government nor any agency thereof, nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or use• fulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any spe• cific commercial product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufac• turer, or otherwise does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recom• mendation, or favoring by the United States Government or any agency thereof. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or any agency thereof. DISCLAIMER Portions of this document may be illegible in electronic image products. Images are produced from the best available original document. *Sr 0^ TABLEl A„K^ V£{) AGENDA Q 2nd MIT INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON THE NEXT GENERATION OF NUCLEAR POWER TECHNOLOGY 25 October 1993 8:00am Registration 8:45am Introductory Remarks: Prof. Michael W. Golay, Conference Chairman 9:00am Session 1 What Role Should Nuclear Power Play, and What Would Life Be Without It? Author: Michael W. Golay, Nuclear Engineering Dept, MIT Respondent: Dr. Robert H. Socolow, Director, Center for Energy & Environmental Sciences, Princeton University Use this session to focus upon advanced reactors and their possible future roles. Outline how the succeeding sessions focus upon important questions, all of which are related to the last session, regarding what our future nuclear strategy should be. This session should include energy markets that can be served by nuclear power, and averted environmental effects that otherwise would be imposed by competing technologies. Concerning global warming, use this session to explore topics including time scales for responses using different technologies to postulated global warming, energy products from nuclear reactors (e.g., hydrogen), worldwide penetration of nuclear-based energy reactors for developing countries, fuel supply constraints and implications. Discuss factors that may limit the role of nuclear power. 10:30am COFFEE BREAK 10:50am Session 2 How Long will the Current Nuclear Power Reactors Operate? Author: Dr. Andrew Kadak, President, Yankee Atomic Electric Co. Respondent: Mr. Mason Willrich, Pacific Gas and Electric Enterprises Use this session to explore topics including factors of economic performance, relicensing and life extension for the existing reactors, and implications of a prematurely reduced nuclear industrial base as it would affect personnel supply, utility interest in nuclear power, the funding base and time horizons for technological innovation. 12:30pm LUNCH 130pm Session 3 Can Nuclear Power Gain Public Acceptance? Author: Dr. Roger Kasperson, Clark University, Worcester Respondent: Prof. Thomas Hughes, University of Pennsylvania at Philadelphia Use this session to explore factors affecting energy technology preferences and aversions, particularly among the general public and among influential minority groups (e.g., environmentalists). Try to distinguish the roles affecting technology acceptance or rejection, of competition for political power, of public attitudes toward organizations identified with different energy technologies and of public judgments of the technologies themselves. 3:00pm COFFEE BREAK 3:20pm Rapporteur's Report - (Rapporteur: Prof. Kent Hansen, Nuclear Engineering Dept., MIT) 11 FOREWORD Structure and Goals of the Conference The Second MIT International Conference on the Next Generation of Nuclear Power Technology is organized by the MIT Program for Advanced Power Studies. The Program is an activity which we began at MIT in order to make a contribution for the success of the next generation of nuclear power. In doing this, we believed that there were important questions where we had relevant expertise at MIT, and that it was appropriate for us to play a leadership role so that any next generation technologies were developed, as well as possible, and for us to provide educational opportunities for students who might wish to participate in such work. About five years ago we decided that in addition to research and student education that it was important also for us to become involved in the public debate concerning nuclear power. The reason for this was that we felt that there would not be a second generation of nuclear power, if our society were not to reach an effective consensus that there should be one, as well as, a consensus regarding what form it would take. We felt that at a university we had the opportunity to provide a forum for that kind of consensus-oriented debate, which we did not see occurring elsewhere. Rather, the kinds of discussions of nuclear power which were visible were generally organized to attract an audience which would agree with the organizers, but where one did not encounter clashing views that would eventually lead to an effective consensus. So, we initiated a series of conferences focused upon the future of nuclear power. This Conference is our second. Our goal was to try to attract a variety of points of view from well-informed people to debate issues concerning nuclear power. Hopefully from that process a better understanding of what we should be doing will emerge. We note that this meeting was sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy and also the Electric Power Research Institute. I believe that they share our view that having this kind of discussion is beneficial for everyone. In organizing the Conference we tried to learn from the previous one. So, we continuously made an effort to see to it that the arguments for the alternatives to nuclear power were given abundant time for presentation. This is ultimately because nuclear power is going to have to compete with all of the energy technologies. Thus, in discussing our energy strategy we must consider all of the alternatives in a reasonable fashion. Everyone participating in the Conference did so by invitation. The structure of the conference was explained in the invitation letter which everyone participating had received. The structure used has seven sessions (see Table 1). The first six led up to the final session which was concerned with what the future nuclear power strategy should be. Each session focused upon a question concerning the future. None of these questions has a unique correct answer. Rather, they address topics where reasonable people can disagree. In order to state some of the important arguments for each session's question, we used the combination of a keynote paper followed by a respondent. The respondent's paper is not necessarily included to be a rebuttal to the keynote; but rather, we recognized that two people will look at a complex question with different shadings. Through those two papers we hoped to get out the most important arguments affecting the question for the session. The purpose of the papers was to set the stage for about an hour of discussion. The real product of this Conference is that discussion. We taped the discussion to use in producing the Conference Proceedings. These consist of the papers and the associated discussions. The same format was used in our first Conference, and the feedback was that this format worked reasonably well. Those Proceedings are available for anyone who will find them of interest. The constituencies that we went to for the participants of this meeting are: • People who are critical of nuclear power, particularly as it is used in the United States; • People who are involved in the nuclear power enterprise within the United States; • People from other countries who are involved in their own nuclear power enterprises; and • Scholars of society and technology, people who are particularly interest in socio- technological controversies and the development of technologies. Table 1 (continued) 3:50pm Session 4 What Role Should Renewable Energy Technology Play; What Would Life Be Like With Them? Author: Dr. Robert Williams, Center for Energy & Environmental Sciences, Princeton University Respondent: Profs. Lawrence M. Lidsky and Steven M. Conn, MIT Use this session to explore the status and promise of various renewable (i.e., solar) technologies. What is the reality, expectation, hope? What roles could the renewable technologies play in supplying energy worldwide? What factors might limit their penetration? Is their promise sufficiently great and confident to justify letting the nuclear option collapse if one is concerned that global warming is a serious threat? 5:10pm ADJOURN 630pm Cocktails, Dinner and Speech Mr. E.C. (Tip) Brolin, U.S. Department of Energy 26 October 1993 9:00am Session 5 What to Do About Nuclear Weapons Proliferation, and Do New Reactors to Consume Plutonium Make Sense? Author: Dr. Hal Feiveson, Center for Energy & Environmental Sciences, Princeton University Respondent: Dr. Robert Budnitz, Future Resources Associates Use this session to characterize the nature of the