delivery of the ideas and philosophy.

Joined up thinking may improve the situation and help to find a path forward..Discussion in the room moved to nuclear self-generation for a while and how far we are away from viable small nuclear power self-generation.

The modular size of small nuclear is critical.Due to the need for power resilience, sites would need to have some arrangement of N+1 power units – if each unit is too large then the investment costs would be simply too high.The modularity of SMRs and suitability to support DC loads will be important.. Licencing and regulation of nuclear power.

Small modular reactors are looking to address some of the licensing and regulation issues with repeatable modular design.. Based upon conversations and work with the small nuclear development ecosystem, there was a stated view that an industrialised modular nuclear offering is 20 years in the future.This view is in stark contrast to some who believe we will see offerings in three to five years.

The difference may be in the maturity of the technology.

Without proven repeatability, regulation will remain arduous.Rather than dealing with a huge volume of project-specific information and having to identify those parts which are ‘cut and paste’ requirements vs. those which are bespoke, supply chains could be working with a much smaller number of requirements, used at scale.

This would enable partners to develop highly repeatable solutions and have them tested or certified or have themselves accredited and ‘pre-qualified’ to meet certain standards, making the entire procurement process more straightforward.. ‘Delivery’.is also linked to ‘Digital Tools’ though a digital marketplace which is very much the missing piece of the puzzle.

However, with the likes of the Hub’s Defining the Need workstream and with a number of digital configurators in use, we are starting to put the enablers in place to facilitate this.. Can we look to digital marketplaces that already exist?.There are plenty of examples from which we can learn; the combination of standard components, digital tools and e-commerce has numerous precedents.