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Korea is close to exporting nuclear power plants for the first time in 14 years since 2008 despite the government's policy of abandoning nuclear power plants. The nuclear power plant industry is now competing to develop new models with safety and economy beyond large-scale nuclear power plants.



Reporter Seo Dong-gyun pointed out how far we have come.



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Small module nuclear power plant, SMR, is attracting the most attention as next-generation nuclear power plant.



It can be used not only for electricity production, but also for seawater desalination, hydrogen production, and even as power for ships.



Russia is already making and using 35 megawatt-class small modular nuclear reactor ships, and in the United States, Tera Power, founded by Bill Gates, is planning to build a 345,000 kilowatt-class small nuclear power plant by 2028 in cooperation with the US Department of Energy.



In the case of the United States, unlike conventional LWRs, it is possible to reprocess spent nuclear fuel while using liquid metallic sodium as a coolant.



[Jung Yong-hoon/Professor of Nuclear Engineering at KAIST: Climate change is now passing into a climate crisis, and an energy portfolio that excludes fossil fuels must be created



, but

nuclear energy is almost the only energy source that does not emit carbon.]

However, our situation is different.



Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute completed the development of a small nuclear power plant called SMART in 2012.



Although it was designed to be safer than existing nuclear power plants on a scale that can power a city of 100,000 people, it has not been commercialized.



The current government, which had been on a nuclear phase-out basis, saw SMR as a nuclear power plant and did not speed it up.



Currently, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy is conducting a preliminary feasibility study for the development of a new SMR with the goal of commercialization in 2028.



The plan is to promote exports without nuclear power plants in our green classification system, but it is not expected to be easy.



[Seung-Hoon Yoo/Professor, Department of Energy Policy, Seoul National University of Science and Technology: Because export banks are also state-run banks, they have to follow the K taxonomy.

(If not, you will have no choice but to raise funds at high interest rates.] Even in the



EU draft, the safe disposal of nuclear waste is a prerequisite, and the next-generation nuclear power plant has not completely solved the waste. The objection that it is difficult to follow is also not easy.



A social consensus is needed to maintain the competitiveness of our nuclear power industry while looking at international trends surrounding nuclear power.



(Video editing: Park Jin-hoon)