mPower and B&W’s search for investors

[bananas]

2. DOE won the Golden Fleece Award for this boondoggle

http://www.taxpayer.net/media-center/article/watchdog-group-doe-support-for-small-modular-reactors-is-fleecing-taxpayers

Watchdog group: DOE support for small modular reactors is ‘fleecing’ taxpayers
Original Publication: SNL Energy, February 27, 2013

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The group, Taxpayers for Common Sense, gave the DOE its "Golden Fleece Award" for the small modular reactor program, singling it out for what the group sees as particularly reckless spending.

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In 2012, the DOE awarded Generation mPower LLC, a joint effort between Babcock & Wilcox Co. and Bechtel Corp., with access to a $450 million funding opportunity to help license and develop the 180-MW small modular reactor, or SMR, it hopes to eventually install at a site owned by the Tennessee Valley Authority.

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Further government investment is worrisome for taxpayers, the group said, because SMRs may never be a cost-effective source of electricity. "In the Department of Energy's materials on SMRs, the agency argues there is a 'need and a market' in the United States for SMRs," a report released alongside the Golden Fleece Award said. "In reality, no one is clamoring to buy an SMR because there is no assurance the electricity will be remotely competitive with power from other sources."

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