Italy Re-Opening the Nuclear Option: Are SMR a Suitable Choice? An Application of the INCAS Model

摘要

The Italian strategic plan for the energy policy targets 25%udof the national generation mix covered by nuclear technologyudby 2030. Considering a demand for electric power of 340 TWhudin 2010 and assuming an annual rate of increase between 2,5%udand 1,0%, the national plan would require to build some 8-10udlarge nuclear power plants, at least. The new generationudcapacity may be covered by EPR or AP1000 technology or,udalternatively, by multiple SMR (i.e. 300-150 MWe), or even audmix of LR and SMR.udThe original intent, prior to the stop imposed by theuddramatic earthquake and tsunami in Japan, was to have the firstudplant deployed by 2020. Today the Italian strategy to re-openudthe nuclear option is undergoing hard criticism and its fate isudcurrently uncertain. In this context, this paper might contributeudto the debate, by exploring the economics of the nuclear optionudwith a focus on the opportunity to invest in large NPP categoryudrather than in multiple, modular SMR. The latter have featuresudthat may compensate the dis-economy of scale and improveudtheir cost-effectiveness, while granting investors with a lowerudup-front investment and a higher capability of project selffinancing.udThe analysis is run through the Polimi’s proprietaryud“INtegrated model for the Competitiveness Analysis of Smalludmodular reactors” (INCAS).Even if some specific inputs areudrelated to the Italian scenario (e.g. the Electricity price) the results can be generalized to countries or utilities that areudplanning to install more than 10 GWe of nuclear capacity.