Opinion: Love for nuclear reactors is finally blooming in Colorado

“But love takes time/And it’s hard to find/You gotta take some time/To let love grow, whoa,” that 1979 Orleans hit was about the human heart but the refrain applies just as easily to nuclear power. Bad analogy? Hang with me.

It has taken some time for Colorado to once again warm up to carbon-free fission technology after its one and only nuclear facility, the St. Vrain Nuclear Plant near Platteville, closed in 1989. During the intervening decades, nuclear technology has advanced significantly. Nuclear plants and spent fuel storage facilities are right for Colorado.

How do we know love is in the air? Interest in nuclear power as a carbon-free alternative to coal power has become bipartisan. Back in 2022, Democrats defeated Senate Bill 73 which would have required the state’s Office of Economic Development to study Small Modular Reactors (SMR) as one solution to the state’s goal of going carbon free. The next year Sen. Larry Liston sponsored legislation to add nuclear energy to the state’s definition of clean, carbon-free energy sources. Nothing happened. Same goes for 2024.

This year, however, Democrats joined Republicans in sponsoring House Bill 1040 to add nuclear power to the clean energy list. If passed, nuclear projects would become eligible for government grants and would qualify as a clean energy source to meet the state’s 2050 carbon elimination targets.

Currently, the state’s electricity is produced through a combination of coal (33%), natural gas (30%), wind (28%), solar (6%), and hydro power (2%). In order to phase out coal, a significant greenhouse gas emitting fuel, the state will need a reliable energy source to complement weather-reliant wind and solar power generation. Hydropower is limited by gravity and geography. It does not work everywhere. Natural gas is harvested as a byproduct from waste water treatment plants and garbage dumps, but most of it is drilled and pumped from the ground. While significantly cleaner than coal, burning it does emit carbon dioxide.

Nuclear power, by contrast, is both carbon-free and can be built anywhere, especially Small Modular Reactors (SMR). They are the next generation of safe, efficient nuclear power production. Simpler in design and smaller than conventional plants, SMRs are less expensive to build and are designed to be built in factories and assembled on site. There are dozens of designs in various stages of development.

A few hours’ drive from the Colorado state line, a sodium-cooled reactor is being built in Kemmerer, Wyoming, by the company TerraPower. Because the Natrium reactor will operate at near normal atmospheric pressure and will not use water as a coolant, it will not be susceptible to the conditions that caused the Three-Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima melt-downs.

Storage of spent fuel has also advanced. Several counties in Northwest Colorado have begun to look at safe storage as a way to bring high-paying jobs to the region as the state cuts back on coal mining and use.

Another sign love is in the air, Coloradans are recognizing the value of nuclear power plants and storage facilities as generators not only of power but of jobs.

If House Bill 1040 passes, Colorado will join Michigan, Minnesota, North Carolina and Utah which have recently added nuclear to their clean energy standards. Kentucky, Tennessee, Ohio and South Dakota are actively studying the feasibility of building a commercial plant.

Conventional nuclear plants exist in 28 states including three of our neighbors. Although the US has the highest number of nuclear reactors in the world, they supply a relatively small proportion of the country’s electricity needs –about 18%. By contrast, 65% of France’s electricity needs are supplied by nuclear power. You could say it’s a country devoted to romance and clean nuclear power. So maybe that Orleans song wasn’t such a bad reference after all?

Krista L. Kafer is a weekly Denver Post columnist. Follow her on Twitter: @kristakafer.

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