US lacks nuclear-power infrastructure

I read with great interest the hopeful items about the coming nuclear power boom (Physics Today, February 2006, pages 11 and 19 ), but I would like to point out that the US has lost the infrastructure to build these plants. Because of economics, the US no longer has the heavy industry capable of building the reactor heads and steam generators that new plants require. Reactor owners looking to replace aging plant components must contract with Japanese, Korean, or Italian companies for the heavy forging and machine work that was once done in America, and compete against other interests for both valuable plant time and floor space to get their components finished. American nuclear plants are just not a 600-pound gorilla that can command the marketplace anymore.

America is also losing the quality battle for smaller components such as pumps, valves, and circuit breakers. Many of the smaller vendors and foundries that once produced pumps, piping, and valves to the ASME Boiler and Pressure Vessel Code (a nuclear requirement) have been swallowed up by mergers, leaving only a few suppliers. And those few have had little incentive to keep a costly quality program that meets the requirements of a nuclear supplier as defined in the Code of Federal Regulations (10CFR50, appendix B) because the market for nuclear replacement parts is scant. Other suppliers have lost control of their quality programs because of such factors as offshore production and the loss of tribal knowledge due to an aging workforce and downsizing.

This isn’t to say that America won’t produce new nuclear power generating stations, but a lot of infrastructure investment will be needed to bring the US back to the level where we can make them using American resources and labor.