American Nuclear Export Controls

This piece deals with what could be regarded as a relatively minor nuclear hurdle compared to, for example, the NRC licensing process. But it does not take much interference to disrupt an efficient, punctual, economic manufacturing process and turn it into a lobbyist ridden, indeterminant trip to apparatchik-land.

In Stage 3, we learned how violations of both the spirit and the letter of the Non-Proliferation Treaty by the weapons states have hobbled nuclear power's ability to solve the Gordian Knot. For Americans, some of these violations of the NPT's ``fullest possible exchange" provision have been codified into law and regulation.

In a futile attempt to maintain a monopoly on nuclear power, the US has enacted a range of export controls. These include rules that prevent Americans from sharing any non-public data about their nuclear power plant design with citizens of any country that has not signed a Section 123 agreement with the US. A 123 agreement requires that a country cede a portion of its sovereignty to the USA, which many countries are unwilling to do. This effectively prohibits non-123 country vendors from competing to supply components to American designs.

To make matters worse, any export of an American component to be used in a nuclear power plant requires a specific license. Any company, American or otherwise, targeting foreign markets cannot rely on American vendors, since the US government on a whim can prohibit exports of American nuclear power components. At a minimum, these licenses throw unacceptable uncertainty into delivery schedules.

There are procedures for getting around these rules; but they involve big lawyer bills, stacks of paper work, and lengthy, uncertain delays. And even after the necessary approvals have been granted, they can be rescinded without recourse, as Bill Gate's TerraPower Chinese effort discovered.

TerraPower is developing a sodium cooled, fast breeder reactor. By about 2013, they thought they were in a position to build and test a half-scale prototype. For all the reasons laid out in previous GK News articles, Gates and his partners concluded this was not feasible in the US. After a costly, multi-year lobbying effort, TerraPower obtained permission from the US government, to form a joint venture with China National Nuclear Power to build the prototype in China. The contract was signed in 2017. In October, 2018, the Trump Department of Energy announced new export rules, which TerraPower found impossible to comply with. The joint venture was dissolved, wiping out a nine figure investment.

Stomping on nuclear power development in the US has been a bipartisan effort. Nixon shut down a promising molten salt program in 1974. Carter shut down nuclear fuel reprocessing in 1977. Clinton shut down the government's successful fast breeder program in 1994. Trump stomped on TerraPower's privately financed venture in 2018. The overall effect is not only to suppress competition, and drive up costs, but also to put would be American providers of nuclear power at an impossible disadvantage relative to people like the Russians.

If the USA wants to play a role in cleaving the Gordian Knot, nuclear power export controls must be done away with. The US must start complying with a treaty it signed 55 years ago.