Small Nuclear Case Study
Australia is a top 5 producer of base metals such as zinc, nickel, gold, uranium and silver (Source: USGS). To extract these minerals, mining operations typically require 10 to 50 megawatts of base load electricity for several years to operate the mining plant and equipment at ideal capacity. Remote area mines without access to base load energy infrastructure such as a high voltage transmission network or a gas pipeline have few options beyond distillate (ie. diesel) fuelled power plants to generate their base load electricity requirements. Consequently, large mineral deposits are either unrealised or under realised due to the financial and operational limitations inherent in the use of large scale distillate power plants in remote areas.
By using a small nuclear reactor such as the Gen4 Module (G4M) a conventional steam turbine balance of plant can be used to generate industrial level base load electricity sufficient to power remote area mining operations thereby circumventing the limitations of large scale distillate power plants.
Learn More