Wisconsin Lawmakers Discuss Pro-Nuclear Energy Bills
GOP bills would conduct nuclear siting study, convene nuclear conference in Madison
Kewaunee Power Station, a decommissioned nuclear power plant located south of the city of Kewaunee, WI. Photo by Royalbroil, (CC BY-SA 3.0), via Wikimedia Commons
Wisconsin could become a leader in nuclear technology and should consider building new nuclear reactors, scientists and lawmakers say.
They spoke Wednesday at a public hearing for two nuclear-related bills in the state Assembly’s Committee on Jobs and Economy.
One bill directs the state’s Public Service Commission to do a nuclear power siting study, due 12 months after the bill’s passage.
The second would organize a one-time Wisconsin nuclear power summit at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s new engineering building upon its completion.
“I think the nuclear renaissance is upon us, and I think it’s here now. And we better be ready for it,” said Rep. Shae Sortwell, R-Two Rivers, at the hearing. He introduced the bills with Rep. David Steffen, R-Howard, and Sen. Julian Bradley, R-New Berlin.
“We’re going to be doing a crawl, walk, run approach to this,” Steffen said. “This is part of that crawl effort.”
He said nuclear power could help the state meet demand for electricity from data center projects in the state. Planned AI data centers in Mount Pleasant and Port Washington might have energy demands on par with large cities.
“With the prospect of data centers coming to Wisconsin, the need for power generation only is going to increase,” Steffen said.
The lawmakers have introduced other pro-nuclear bills this session.
But Steffen also pitched his bills — particularly the summit bill — as a step toward making Wisconsin a leader in new nuclear technologies, like nuclear fusion.
“We have a unique opportunity to make Wisconsin the ‘Silicon Valley’ of nuclear energy production, nuclear energy research, nuclear energy supply chain and jobs,” he said.
A provision reclassifying nuclear energy as renewable is part of a different, controversial transmission line bill advanced by some Republicans. If that bill doesn’t pass, Sortwell said: “We’re going to pull [the nuclear provision] out and run it as a separate bill.”
Both bills have all-Republican sponsors, except for Lisa Subeck, D-Madison, on the siting study bill.
Researchers, startups working on nuclear fusion in Wisconsin
“It has been many years since new nuclear power plants have been considered in the state of Wisconsin, and in that time there have been many substantial changes in the technology of nuclear energy,” said Paul Wilson, a nuclear engineering professor at UW-Madison, at the hearing.
Nuclear reactors now come in smaller sizes, he said. That means they can be put on retired nuclear and coal sites, or used on-site for industrial facilities. He also said new small modular reactors can be primarily made in off-site factories and assembled on-site.
The siting study bill instructs the PSC to take into account a 2024 Department of Energy report on nuclear energy siting. That report said Wisconsin has two coal plant sites that could accommodate nuclear reactors, but it didn’t specify which ones. It said one nuclear power plant in Wisconsin — Point Beach Nuclear Plant is the only one — has potential for additional reactors.
Another change involves nuclear fusion. According to Oliver Schmitz, another UW-Madison nuclear engineer who testified at the hearing, traditional nuclear reactors run on fission — making heat by splitting heavy elements’ atoms. Fusion does it by merging light elements’ atoms.
At least two Wisconsin companies — Realta Fusion and Shine Technologies — hope to build nuclear fusion reactors. Schmitz co-founded Realta. He said building actual fusion reactors depends on developing a manufacturing supply chain for their parts.
“All startups that have emerged across the world, they are hitting supply chain limits,” Schmitz said.
But he said Wisconsin’s heavy industry, high-tech manufacturing and supply chain sectors could make it “obtain leadership” in a “worldwide nuclear renaissance.”
‘The nuclear renaissance’: Wisconsin lawmakers discuss pro-nuclear energy bills was originally published by Wisconsin Public Radio.
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