The Division of the Air Drive has chosen Joint Base-San Antonio as the positioning of a nuclear microreactor as a part of a pilot program that goals to supply the navy with steady energy provides.
Nevertheless, specialists warning that even “superior reactors” like this include their very own dangers.
The San Antonio base was one among three websites chosen for a pilot program known as Superior Nuclear Energy for Installations (ANPI), which endeavors to harness nuclear vitality within the title of “vitality resilience,” with the aim of guaranteeing that navy bases don’t lose energy, even in a blackout.
This system was introduced in a Wednesday information launch from the Secretary of the Air Drive Public Affairs, which additionally revealed Colorado and Montana as the primary two websites of the ANPI program.
“The way forward for air and area dominance is powered by resilient vitality,” Michael Borders, assistant secretary of the Air Drive for Power, Installations and Surroundings, mentioned in a press release. “By integrating superior nuclear expertise, we aren’t simply retaining the lights on; we’re guaranteeing that our most important nationwide safety missions won’t ever be held in danger by an influence outage. This can be a pivotal second for the Division of the Air Drive.”
Nevertheless, not everyone seems to be satisfied that doubling down on nuclear energy will clear up the vitality woes of the USA, or its Air Drive.
Joshua Frank, California-based creator of a number of books trying critically at nuclear energy and different vitality sources, instructed the Present the chance outweighs the reward.
“There are many causes to be involved about one among these in your yard,” mentioned Frank, who additionally co-edits progressive publication CounterPunch. “First, there may be all the time the potential for accidents. No reactor is ever 100% secure. Second, small reactors nonetheless produce extremely radioactive waste. Actually, they generate extra waste per unit of vitality than bigger reactors. And bear in mind, we have now nowhere to place all this nasty stuff, which is able to stay radioactive for over 100 thousand years. It’ll both sit on web site indefinitely or be transported proper by the group to a different location.”
Frank’s e book Atomic Days: The Untold Story of the Most Poisonous Place in America particulars the catastrophic radioactive waste disaster at Washington State’s Hanford Nuclear Reservation, which produced plutonium for the U.S. nuclear arsenal for many years. Consequently, it’s additionally the positioning of the priciest environmental cleanup in world historical past at $677 billion.
Established in 1943 as a part of the Manhattan Mission and decommissioned within the ’60s, the Hanford web site has skilled leaking tanks, contaminated amenities and contaminated groundwater, threatening the close by Colombia River. A half century later, cleanup continues to be ongoing.
As of 2026, one of many web site’s tanks continues to be leaking an estimated 1.5–3.5 gallons of radioactive waste every day and others tanks are additionally recognized to be actively releasing waste, the State of Washington’s Division of Ecology studies.
Frank launched Atomic Days in 2022 in reply to calls from some quarters to make use of nuclear vitality to offset fossil fuels and their impression on the surroundings. Some environmental advocates noticed nuclear vitality as a miracle repair, which Frank argues indulged in myth-making round its security and efficacy.
“We’re on the lookout for the solutions to a query that vexes us proper now,” Power Secretary Rick Perry mentioned on the CERAWeek convention in Houston final week, the Houston Chronicle studies. “I don’t understand how anyone who cares in regards to the surroundings can’t be for nuclear.”
The ANPI initiative seeks to have at the very least one superior nuclear reactor working on at the very least one Air Drive set up by 2030 or sooner, in response to the discharge. Air Drive officers add that subsequent steps will embody siting and environmental analyses as a part of the Nationwide Environmental Coverage Act course of.
JBSA is partnering with Antares Nuclear Inc. on the venture. Based in 2023, the three-year-old firm to has but to conduct its first reactor demonstration.
“Antares is presently within the closing section of the Division of Power’s Reactor Pilot Program to construct a reactor that achieves criticality — a steady, self-sustaining nuclear fission response — earlier than July 4, 2026,” in response to the corporate’s web site.
Nonetheless, Antares officers count on the San Antonio R1 microreactor to be operational by 2028.
‘Advertising gimmick’
Regardless of official assurances that San Antonio’s incoming microreactor represents a brand new type of “superior” nuclear expertise, Frank urged residents to not purchase the hype.
“These so-called superior nuclear reactors should not superior; that’s only a advertising and marketing gimmick,” he instructed the Present. “They use the identical fission course of as different reactors.”
Frank added that the San Antonio micro-reactor can also be prone to put additional pressure on the water provide, which is already up in opposition to the persistent drought of Texas. It additionally would come on-line because the rising information heart trade continues to pressure the state’s water assets.
“[T]hey’ll require a gentle water provide in a drought-prone local weather,” Frank added.
Frank’s upcoming e book Unhealthy Power: The AI Hucksters, Rogue Lithium Extractors, and Wind Industrialists Who Are Promoting Off Our Future is due out in August from Haymarket Books.
Along with its potential environmental impression, nuclear energy can also be dearer than different types of energy technology.
“[T]listed below are far cheaper methods to boil water to generate electrical energy that don’t require large taxpayer subsidies,” Frank mentioned. “These tasks are all the time costly boondoggles.”
The price of reactor development has additionally skyrocketed in recent times, in response to a report by the Houston Chronicle. As such, NRG has seemed to broaden the present South Texas Nuclear Mission for years however has held off resulting from price.
Subsidizing nukes
In an effort to drive down nuclear vitality costs, New York and Illinois have backed their nuclear energy. State legislatures in Ohio and Pennsylvania are contemplating comparable subsidies.
In June 2025, Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed Home Invoice 14 into legislation which established the Texas Superior Nuclear Power Workplace (TANEO) and created the $350 million Texas Superior Nuclear Growth Fund (TANDF), the biggest nuclear funding within the nation.
“To energy the Texas of tomorrow, we should increase our state’s superior nuclear capability,” Governor Abbott mentioned in an early-April assertion, asserting that functions to this system have been open.
“Nuclear vitality supplies an environment friendly and dependable vitality resolution whereas creating high-wage superior manufacturing jobs,” Abbott added. “By way of TANEO and the Texas Superior Nuclear Growth Fund, Texas is streamlining the nuclear regulatory surroundings and making investments to spur a flourishing nuclear vitality ecosystem for generations to come back.”
Thursday marks the final day nuclear builders can submit a discover of intent to use for the subsidy program with formal functions due by Might 14.
Beneath TANDF, nuclear tasks that construct superior reactors are eligible to use for the Mission Growth and Provide Chain Reimbursement Program and the Superior Nuclear Development Reimbursement Program.
The Texas subsidy program, like these in different states, is meant to deal with the upper price of nuclear energy, which must compete with the state’s comparatively low price of its ample oil & fuel and different vitality sources.
Texas can also be the primary state for wind vitality manufacturing within the nation. And whereas California is the highest state for photo voltaic vitality manufacturing, Texas is at quantity two and shutting in on the Golden State with probably the most fast progress the market, in response to a report by the Photo voltaic Power Industries Affiliation.
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Regardless of being marketed as ‘superior nuclear vitality,’ the microreactor pilot program comes with waste and value considerations, and it entails a partnership with a brand new firm that’s but to conduct its first reactor demonstration.
