Small modular reactors, for example, are part of a promising new generation of advanced reactors that can automatically avoid overheating. These nuclear fission devices, which can be manufactured in a plant and brought to a site for installation, have a smaller physical footprint, and they produce less nuclear waste because they get more output from nuclear fuel. Some of these reactors are only about twice the length of the average school bus, while a traditional nuclear plant is roughly the size of Central Park.
The innovation doesn’t stop with small modular reactors. MIT researchers are planning to build a reactor that would generate energy the same way the sun does — through nuclear fusion. Compared with traditional fission plants, the waste produced during nuclear fusion is less radioactive, and the raw ingredients that fuel fusion are more abundant than uranium.
Fossil fuels, of course, are still a key part of America’s…
