 Okay, ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much. Delighted to have you here. This is going to be fun tonight and of course we've got two really superb teams and two remarkable schools and it's going to be a battle of the Titans. I'm excited to hear this. It's a topic that I personally care a great deal about and I'm probably not objective on it. Okay, so that's the first thing I should say. But let me try to stay as objective as I can just for a few minutes to frame the importance of this. The foundation of America's 60-year history on this question goes back to the very famous Adams for Peace speech that President Eisenhower formulated. And I think it was probably one of the most salient and important policy frameworks that's ever been developed in the last 60 years. It was one that we had to think through. Many of the other policy frameworks that we had over the last 60 years were forced on us. We had to figure it out. We had really serious problems and we just had to figure it out and we usually stumbled our way until we got to a defendable posture. But this was one we actually had to conceptualize. And it took a number of years really to get to it. And we had to think through what was going to be this framework that would harness the potential of nuclear energy as an abundant commercial source of electricity and reconcile it against all of the risks that come with nuclear proliferation. You know, every weapons program essentially springs from the foundation that's of commercial nuclear energy. You know, every one. Because it's all about enriching nuclear material. In the natural world, uranium doesn't appear in any quantity that you could use it. So you have to concentrate it. So you concentrate it from one thousandth of one percent in ore stock to get it up to about four percent. But that represents about 85 percent of the work it takes to get to a weapon. Because to go from four percent to 90 percent is only the last 15 percent of the job. And that's been the inherent dilemma of this. We knew that there was such enormous promise and there still is enormous promise in commercial nuclear energy. Let me just give you a sense of scale on this. A thousand megawatt plant of nuclear power. If you were going to fuel that with fuel oil, we don't do it that way anymore, but if you were to try to generate a thousand megawatts with fuel oil, you know those great big tanker trucks that drive up, you know, to the gas station at night and fill up the gas station? One plant would empty one of those trucks every seven minutes. That gives you a sense of scale of nuclear power. It's an enormous source of base power generation, an enormous sense. There's nothing quite like it. But it does have also this inherent risk, the security risk. So when Adam's for peace was formulated, it was trying to find a framework that put this in balance. And ironically, it isn't well understood. But the commercial nuclear side of nuclear power is the essential ingredient of transparency to try to prevent proliferation. Because we ask countries to sign up to the NPT treaty. And I will tell you, 90% of everything we know that's going on in Iran is because they signed up to the NPT treaty. Because they had the right to develop commercial nuclear energy. So it's a very complicated landscape. Commercial nuclear energy cannot be separated from the future of proliferation prevention. See, this central complex problem which got embedded together in the Adam's for peace is still with us 60 years later. And we're still debating it. And it's an important debate. The most important thing about the debate is that all of us honestly go through the details. I don't have any idea which side you guys are on tonight. And I know when it comes to debating, you flip sides. I mean, that's good too. It is having the debate. It's having that foundation of knowledge about what we're facing. What we're facing as a country, as a world. That's why I think this topic is so important. Very important. And it is not understood in Washington. So I'm grateful that you guys are coming to Washington. It's a bit of a missionary project here. You're going to bring all of this back alive. And you're going to help us rethink this whole complex landscape. Thank you for doing that. And I want to welcome and thank all of you for coming today. Let's turn this over to you guys. I don't know who's going to really run this. Are you running this, Karen? All right, get up here. I had my say. Terrific. Thank you, Dr. Hamery. It's great to see a room full of people for this event. My name is Karen Meacham. I'm the director of educational outreach here and the dean of our Leadership Academy. And again, very excited to host you all for this exciting evening. One thing I wanted to say is the currency of ideas here in Washington or the currency of Washington is ideas. That's what I meant to say. The currency of Washington is ideas. And CSIS is definitely in this ideas business, right? And a major part of my work here is to run our Leadership Academy. And a big part of the Leadership Academy is our fabulous debate clinic, which really looks at these fundamentals of argument and advocacy and developing these ideas and knowledge, as Dr. Hamery alluded to. And I have to pause just for a moment to recognize a couple of people in the audience who have been leaders in our debate clinic, Eli Jacobs, who this whole event tonight was his idea. Eli, please raise your hand. Quit looking back. Eli Jacobs, Sarah Weiner, raise your hand. She runs a lot of our debate clinics for our interns. Seth Gannon's in the audience. John Warden. Matt Fisher. I saw Stephanie Spees. Again, these are people on staff at CSIS. They are research assistants. They work very hard on whether they're in the nuclear program or global health or other programs, and they do this on the side. So again, they're dedicated to this concept of debate, developing ideas, argument, advocacy. So I'm excited to present an event tonight featuring some of the finest debaters in the country. And just to give you an idea, and many of you in the audience are also debaters or former debaters, but in a regular season of a typical year in college debate, there are seven major national tournaments. And each of these tournaments draws the majority of the best teams from around the country. So in the 2012-2013 academic year, these two teams from Georgetown and Northwestern collectively won six out of the seven national tournaments. So you could say they're pretty good, pretty good at this. So not only are they talented debaters, but they've been spending the past year debating about U.S. energy policy. So thousands of hours really researching nuclear energy and all of its nuances and capacity. Here tonight, so to put knowledge to good use, we're advancing, they're actually here advancing the national debate about the future of nuclear power in the United States. So I want to spend a little bit of time introducing these debaters individually. I also want to recognize our panel of expert judges. They're issue experts. I want to read their bios briefly and then give you a little bit of the layout for the evening. Eli Jacobs, who again I said was the brainchild behind this entire event, is going to come up and help with the debate because he's a pro. So from Georgetown, which will represent the affirmative in this debate, is Andrew Markoff and Andrew Arsht. So in reverse order, Andrew Arsht is a theology major. Andrew Markoff is an international history major. They're both juniors. And if you're curious, they were actually ranked number one this past year nationally. From Northwestern, which will represent the negative as close at their heels in national championships, we have Peyton Lee and Arjun Velayipan. Peyton Lee is our lone senior over there. She's a math and political science major and will be going to law school at Harvard next year. So she's a shabby, you know, slacker, I can tell. And Arjun is a sophomore studying economics. And again, they were also at the top of the field in these national competitions. We are looking over the podium incredibly lucky to have three issue experts as judges. We have our own in-house David Banks, who is new here, but he comes with a terrific background. He's a senior fellow deputy director of the nuclear energy program here at CSIS, where he focuses on the link between the health of the U.S. civil nuclear sector and U.S. national security interests, including capabilities of the nuclear-powered U.S. Navy and U.S. influence to shape global proliferation safety standards. So again, he has a distinguished background in the private sector. He spent several years in the Senate and also in the Bush administration as senior advisor on international affairs and climate change to the chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. So again, executive experience, legislative experience. So sitting next to David, thank you, David, for joining us, we have Scott Siegel, who is head of the Policy Resolution Group and founder of the Strategic Communications Practice at Bracewell in Giuliani. He's over two decades of experience across a broad range of policy and communication issues, specifically dealing with energy, the environment, natural resources. My understanding is that Scott was also a debater, is that fair? So, hey, there you go. Really appreciate you being here. Last but not least, Thomas Lawler, who is a principal at Lawler Strategies, where he works with a variety of groups, corporations, and advocacy groups to really work with them on their federal policy goals. And previously, he spent some time in the Senate. He served as chief policy advisor on energy and environmental issues for Senator Carper from Delaware and managed the subcommittee on clean air and nuclear safety for the Environment and Public Works Committee. So again, our three judges, where we have definitely itch area experts here with the debaters, but really people that have had a career of these issues in judging. So much appreciated. Last but not least, I do want to thank our sponsors who, Bracewell and Giuliani, Southern, and I'm going to get this wrong. The Nuclear Energy Institute, who graciously provided the sushi and lovely beverages and everything else in the back. So please thank you. Please join me in thanking our sponsors. Okay, so let's get to the meat of the program. I'm going to, again, welcome, thank you, and pass it over to Eli, who is going to help us with the formalities. Thanks again. All right, so thank you all for coming. I'll be brief. Just three notes. First, the resolution tonight, the topic is that the United States should revitalize its nuclear power industry. And the team from Georgetown, which is to my far right, will be affirmative. So they'll say that's a good idea. Team from Northwestern to my closer right will be negative and they'll say it's a bad idea. Second note is about format. You all were distributed an agenda at the door, so I won't go into too much detail. But basically, each of the debaters here will give a five-minute speech followed by three minutes of questions from the other team. After that sort of initial set of four units of speech, there'll be some questions from our expert panel of judges, after which we'll turn it over to the audience for audience questions. And then each debate team, each team will give a five-minute concluding rebuttal, and then we'll turn it back over to our judges for 15 minutes of concluding comments and remarks. The last note is that you should be sure that you use microphones at all time, so this is true for debaters and judges. There's a little button at the bottom there, so just turn it on, and that's so that our online audience and posterity will be able to see and hear the event. Alright, so thanks again for coming, and I'll turn it over to, I guess, Andrew Markoff to get us started. Good evening, everyone. Thanks for coming. Before I start, I just want to give a couple very quick thank-yous to the CSIS for their incredible hospitality having us here today. Obviously, our three judges, Mr. Banks, Mr. Siegel, Mr. Lawler, for taking the time out of their schedule to come watch and give us comments. To the audience, everyone who showed up, it's great to have a large crowd here, and hopefully you'll enjoy it. To Dr. Hamery and Ms. Meacham for introducing the debate, and for Eli Jacobs, of course, for saying this all up, as well as all the sponsors for providing necessary funding. So without further ado, let's get underway. In this debate, me and my partner, Andrew Arsh, will argue that the DOD should take a first mover role and purchase small module reactors for its domestic bases in the United States. A small module reactor, or SMR, is a nuclear reactor which produces less than 300 megawatts of electricity. Now, a large light-water reactor usually produces between maybe 1,000 to 1,200 megawatts. So we're talking about a three to four-fold reduction in output with a corresponding decrease in size, water consumption, fuel, et cetera. Now, as some of you may have heard, the Department of Energy recently gave out $500 million in loans to develop SMRs in Georgia. But the existing package is going to prove vastly insufficient to create a new nuclear industry in the United States for two reasons. First, the cost of achieving approval from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a commercial SMR is estimated to be about $2 billion. The existing loan package is not nearly enough to create an SMR hooked up to the grid, even if it creates a demonstration. Second, is that the DOE as an institution lacks the market pull and the experience commercializing new technologies in order to get an industry off the ground. The DOD, however, can solve these shortfalls. Jeffrey Marcuse, who's the Executive Director of the Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program at DOD, explains in 2012, reasons for past failures at DOE are lack of a market within DOE, a disconnect between business practices at DOE and commercial practices. Since DOE is neither the ultimate supplier nor the ultimate buyer of these technologies, there are challenges in creating a system that can bring technologies across the valley of death. DOD's market size, however, allows it to play a critical role that can overcome these challenges. So why pursue SMRs? We think there are many reasons, but we'll be brief and isolate too. First is nonproliferation. SMRs create a strong nuclear export market that will strengthen the domestic nuclear industrial base, which is critical to U.S. leverage over the international fuel cycle. CSIS is very own Michael Wallace and Sarah Williams right in 2012. America's nuclear energy industry is in decline. China, India, Russia, and other countries are looking to significantly expand their nuclear commitments. 15 new nations could have this tech within the next two decades. America's ability to exert leadership is directly linked to the strength of our domestic industry. In the past, the U.S. provided a model for industry self-regulation. The results were not perfect, but America's institutional support for global nonproliferation helped shape the way nuclear tech was adopted and used. This influence seems to be certain to Wayne if the U.S. is no longer a major supplier or user of nuclear tech. Second, SMRs will insulate DOD bases from grid vulnerability, which is a growing risk to effective operations and command infrastructure in the United States. George Robattile, who is a civilian working on the Army's strategy research report, wrote in 2012. The Department of Defense depends on electricity at military facilities, which are controlled by a public grid, which is susceptible to age of infrastructure, natural disasters, and cyber attacks. The DOD, in fact, gets 99% of their electrical requirements from the public grid. Components, however, are over 100 years old. Admiral Blair, the former director of National Intelligence, testified before Congress that the growing connectivity of our grid creates opportunities for attackers. SMRs, however, are able to provide a secure and independent source of electricity in the event the public grid is compromised. Now, one concern raised by critics of SMRs is cost. Can they compete? We think they can. Ionis Kestadis and Vladimir Kutsov from the World Bank explained in 2012, SMRs overcome key barriers that have inhibited the growth of nuclear power. They have smaller size, lower power, and simpler design, which allow for greater modularization of units, standardization, and fabrication. SMRs can benefit from the economies of multiples that accrue to mass production of components in a factory. Building reactors in a series instead of individually can lead to significant per-unit cost reductions. Another concern is safety, and we think there are two important things to note. First, the sum total of life-threatening injuries or deaths that have resulted from commercial nuclear accidents in the United States is zero ever, which is far less than casualties from industrial accidents associated with any other energy source. Second, SMRs incorporate new passive safety features which prevent accidents. Robert Rosner, a professor of astrophysics at the University of Chicago and the former director of the Argon National Laboratory explains in 2011 that SMR designs incorporate passive safety features that utilize gravity driven or natural convection systems. SMRs have a much lower level of heat decay and require less cooling after reactor shutdown. Designs eliminate the need for backup. They improve seismic capability. They provide large and robust underground pool storage for waste. These designs present a strong safety case for SMRs. Thank you. So, you mentioned NRC hurdles as a key barrier to the current DOE, SMR development. What does a DOD first mover role do to avoid that concern? I mean, I guess I would say two things. First is that the NRC has to license small mileage or reactors no matter what. Now, that process isn't much different from licensing existing light water reactors. And we believe since that they're safer, smaller, easier to construct, that that's a relatively painless process. But second, the DOD as a multiple decade user of nuclear fuel for nuclear submarines, for example, has a working relationship with the NRC that's far stronger than the DOE does. That's fair. How long do you believe or does the Wallace and Williams expert evidence discuss for developing a robust domestic commercial nuclear base in order to gain international leverage? Yeah, that's a great question, Arjun. A few things. The designs for SMRs have already been drawn up. So we know how to build them. We know what they look like. We largely know how they'll work. There have been demonstrations before the Navy has built them, as I alluded to earlier. Obviously, it's not a quick process, though. You need to get SMR factories up and running. You need to get the DOD to first purchase technology, then disseminate it to the private sector. We would say, you know, maybe a decade, maybe two. But there's an important signal that we think even just the initial act of revitalizing nuclear would have for people who might be concerned about proliferation risks that I think we should also be aware of. Sure. And then in the context of that, you talk about kind of the small scale civilian efforts that are happening. Why aren't those the sufficient signal or starting point for SMRs that your evidence discusses? Well, I think, you know, we outlined that in the beginning. The DOE allocated about 500 million to the Savannah River test site in Georgia for small module reactors. And that is definitely sufficient or maybe sufficient to create a demonstration project. So we'll build an SMR. It will run. It will work. But is it enough to overcome the licensing hurdles to construct multiple? We don't think so. And the piece of evidence we read from the Markuzzi study says that the DOD has unique connections with industry. So if the DOE acts as a test bed, they're like, we'll build this SMR. The industry thinks the DOE is incredible. They think the DOE won't purchase from them if they decide to create their own SMR units. And the DOD, by contrast, regularly purchases from the private sector. And it regularly engages with those private sector contractors. So there's a more credible signal of commitment from the DOD than the DOE. Last question. You talk about grid vulnerabilities. If it truly has been so vulnerable in an urgent need of repair since the 2008 Defense Science Board report that you're evidence sites, how can you account for the absence of an effective attack or total shutdown? I think so. Part of the piece of evidence by Robotyle in that study talks about how there have been probes to the U.S. grid by hackers, perhaps from China, Russia or non-state actors. So the risk is sort of increasing. Plus we know from O3 how vulnerable the grid is. And sorry, I won't go anywhere over time. Thank you. Arjun and I would also like to say thank you for everyone who's shown up today. We appreciate you taking your time out of your busy schedules. To Dr. Hamry and Ms. Meacham for the kind introductions, CSIS and especially Eli for putting this all together, the judges for donating their time and correcting whatever we say at the end. So in response, we believe the Department of Defense should not pursue a first mover role in the development of SMRs for a number of reasons. First and foremost is that small modular reactors, especially in the context of a first mover role, are extraordinarily expensive. No matter what benefits that they provide, those must be weighed against the inevitable costs associated with their development and their procurement. According to Marcus King, an associate research professor of international affairs at George Washington University, the first of a kind expense of developing small nuclear power plants would be in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Thomas Cochran, a member of the Department of Energy's Nuclear Energy Advisory Committee, states that even once developed, the materials cost per kilowatt of a reactor goes up as the size goes down. The reactor surface area which dominates material costs goes up. Secondary containment, independent systems for control, instrumentation, and emergency management all increase as size decreases since each modularized unit requires its own system. This means that both during the initial development and the later stages of use, SMRs might be even more expensive than current light water reactors. In the current state of sequestration cuts, forced budgetary tradeoffs, and extreme demands on the military, the addition of an unnecessary and extremely expensive investment in new SMR technology is unmerited and dangerous. The second serious drawback to SMR procurement for the military is the potential waste and safety issues presented by SMRs. There is currently no federal repository for nuclear waste disposal, and while SMRs could be designed to minimize such byproducts, Nick Cunningham, a policy analyst for energy and climate at the American Security Project, supports a large expansion of domestic SMR use will still run into the issue of disposal with no current solution. The safety drawbacks of SMRs also present a troubling issue. In particular, the presence of nuclear reactors on military bases massively amplifies the consequences of any meltdown. Daniel Nexen, an associate professor in the school of Foreign Service and the Department of Government at Georgetown University, points out that the presence of a base makes an extremely attractive target for attack. While mitigated risks of meltdowns are extremely promising, the potential for an unpredictable collapse still presents an extreme danger when located so close to critical facilities. In particular, the NRC has no current licensing pathway for SMRs, which presents a major hurdle to safe and widespread development. With regards to the benefits that Georgetown has isolated, let us first say that in the status quo there are major efforts being made to develop SMRs in conjunction with the DOE and the DOD. While the DOD might have market pull for widespread adoption of SMRs, the reactors themselves are still in its stage of technology development that is most effectively nurtured by the funding provided by the DOE. John E. Kelly, the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Reactor Technologies in the DOE's Office of Nuclear Energy, testified before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources and stated that the current programs will allow cost sharing components that will bring in a couple of years what the industry would be able to do with private investments. However, what is slowing the development is the regulatory process, which is a four to six year effort that allows them to have confidence in the safety and security of those units. In particular, this is the approach that the DOD itself has recommended. According to Marcus King, Congress directed the DOD to assess the use of nuclear on military installations in a National Defense Authorization Act of 2010. And because of questions about economic feasibility as a first mover and the risks of being an early adopter of the technology, the DOD preferred not to undertake the project and instead supported the current framework for DOE and DOD partnership and risk sharing, cemented in a memorandum of understanding in 2010. With regards to non-proliferation, this is not a unique reason to pursue DOD SMR development. Obviously commercial expansion of nuclear captures many of the advantages of proliferation leadership. We find it implausible that states choosing to pursue dangerous proliferation technologies will be influenced or dissuaded by the efforts of the United States to develop a more improved nuclear device. Georgetown has stated that 15 other countries are all expanding their investment in nuclear energy now and provide clear alternatives to nations do not wish to be influenced by the United States norms of non-proliferation and technology. This is a time scale for developing and deploying SMRs domestically and the improbable link between the development of SMRs and non-proliferation objectives means this hardly appears to be a sufficient reason for the massive investment. With regards to grid vulnerability, status quo efforts have resolved these issues. Their evidence is all in the context of a 2008 report that identified the civilian grid as a critical vulnerability. According to Michael Amoni from the Office of the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense, the DOD has since taken action including a massive increase in backup generation capability linked to critical assets to ensure that power could last through an extended outage. Advanced microgrids are a cost-effective approach being utilized to ensure islanding from civilian grids and steady supply under all circumstances. For all of the reasons outlined above, we believe the DOD should not pursue a first mover role on small modular reactors. Thank you. Okay, Peyton, so the first thing I want to chat about is this, you cite Professor Nexon who, you know, as Georgetown students, we're big fans of, but his claim here seems a little outlandish. The presence of an SMR on a base makes an extremely attractive target for attack. How exactly does someone go about attacking a U.S. military base? Well, our evidence says that that risk, right, the potential either for meltdown or for intentional attack, I personally do not make those plans, but I imagine is one that would sort of be incentivized by the presence of something that would massively meltdown, especially if you're right about sort of base vulnerability. You say that in the status quo, the DOD is already pursuing a policy to create advanced microgrids. What are those? Yes. So microgrids are systems that use backup power systems. They can use things like diesel, renewables, et cetera, and it's a way to monitor the interactions between those. It's a version of SMART grids. Okay. But just, sorry, just to be clear. They rely on diesel and renewable generation. In the status quo, I think they rely on conventional sources, right? They are not explicitly for nuclear right now for all the reasons we think. So coal or natural gas or... Or renewables or diesel, right? Okay. You made an argument about materials cost to say that the cost of SMRs is extremely high. So we made an argument that as you continue to build out SMRs, you can build them in a factory. And mass produce components. Why does it matter how much, like, the concrete costs? Yeah. So I agree that long term you can make it cost less to produce them when you sort of manufacture them, but that's a relative cost comparison. Yes, that costs less than the first few that you build, which is also probably reason the DOD shouldn't fund the first few. But that's still a huge amount of cost because the basic materials component, which our evidence says is a major part of nuclear costs, those still increase because your modularity is a huge part of the cost. And those still increase because you're modularizing them. So instead of one big case, you have multiple little cases for the same amount of power. That makes sense. You made an allusion to a DOD, DOE Memoranda of Understanding. What does that lay out? In 2010, it's their cooperation on energy questions. So it was explicitly they were tasked with evaluating whether or not we should pursue nuclear on bases, right, what you think we should do. And the DOD said that because of first mover costs and because of the risks of being a new adopter of a technology that's yet unproven, that instead the DOE should pursue the research and investment that they're currently doing to develop those technologies before the DOD starts using them. So the DOD is currently not committed to purchasing an SMR? I don't believe so. Otherwise I think your AF is done, right? Right, that makes total sense. The last sort of question is about waste. You make an argument that when we build out more SMRs, there will be more waste. And I guess, you know, right now we store waste on site, which seems to be at least in the medium term somewhat sustainable. Yeah, there are certainly regulatory concerns about whether or not that is an effective solution, but your advocacy is for a massive expansion of the amount of nuclear that we use to power every military base in the United States and spillover commercially, which would be a lot more. Thank you. Okey-doke. Before I begin, I'd like to echo, excuse me, the thank yous said earlier, but for the sake of time, I'll not repeat what Markov said so eloquently. So there we go. I'll start by addressing the nonproliferation argument that was in our first speech, since the negative seems to misunderstand the argument. SMRs might not stop states that have already made the decision to nuclearize. That's not our point. SMRs accomplish two ancillary goals that contribute to reducing the risk of breakout capabilities before they ever arise. First, a strong domestic nuclear industrial base allows the U.S. to offer states seeking civilian nuclear power a viable alternative to domestic enrichment and reprocessing capabilities, what Dr. Hamry referenced in his introduction. An SMR falls within almost every government's economic capabilities and is uniquely suited to older, smaller power grids. If a country decided to pursue domestic enrichment and reprocessing, in spite of the offer of an SMR, the international community could flag such an incident and take subsequent precautionary action. Right now, there is no way to accomplish this objective because the nuclear nonproliferation treaty specifically protects states' rights to enrichment and reprocessing for peaceful purposes. We think SMRs are unique because they largely bypass this concern because they're a self-contained unit. Specifically, U.S. commercial leadership furthers our ability to influence the norms that pervade the international discussion that occurs over nuclear weapons. The pretension that Russia, India, and China will just fill in and pursue the same norms as the U.S. is an exercise, we think, in historical ignorance. Now for grid vulnerability, microgrids are a good start, but they're not being implemented as widely as the Defense Department has advertised. Daniel Seder, a research fellow at Global Green USA, writes in 2011, in the first six months of 2011, the grid suffered 155 blackouts. Bases rely solely on the grid to power 99% of warfighting capabilities. DoD rarely invests in microgrids. DoD's net-zero initiative does little to increase energy assurance at military installations. Additionally, as established by my partner in cross-examination, microgrids rely on inputs that are themselves subject to intermittency and entirely unproven. If the choice is between a whole new grid and SMRs, it seems like their arguments about escalating operation and maintenance costs are largely irrelevant. Now for Northwestern's core concerns. It's true that SMRs are expensive, but the military purchases its electricity from the civilian market now, which puts tremendous pressure on budgets. This is especially true overseas, where oil is often the only possible. Their Cochrane evidence relies on a slate of hand that equates square footage of concrete with total costs. The massive expense involved in constructing a new containment facility for each large reactor is resolved as explained via factory fabrication. Since there's only one self-contained standard model, even safety overhead should be subject to those same diminishing returns of scale. The waste concern is frankly old news and applies to all nuclear power, not just SMRs. Perhaps a new SMR industry would lift the political sclerosis that surrounds the waste issue now. Perhaps eventually, SMRs will use generation 4 designs that consume old waste to produce power. Regardless, there's a ton of it sitting in dry casks at every nuclear facility in the country, and they have not presented why a permanent geological storage facility is preferable, necessary, or even in the offing. This isn't our problem, it's theirs, because we move in the right direction. DoD knows the risks of putting SMRs in a combat theater, and would not do so for the very reasons listed in their necks in evidence. Like many of the negatives concerns, we think it's a problem that resolves itself via simple precautions on the part of agency officials. As far as an attack on a domestic base is concerned, I'd say there are easier ways for interested parties to acquire nuclear material, and there's never been a successful attack on a domestic conventional reactor which have less security than a military base. What about accidents? The argument that the military lacks experience operating and handling nuclear reactors is patently false. The Navy has accrued thousands of reactor years of operating life without a single accident, but the Army has also successfully operated an SMR-style reactor in the 1970s. Brigadier General, retired, Jerry Galloway, a professor of engineering and public policy at the University of Maryland remarks. Small nuclear reactors aboard the Sturgis provided power to the Panama Canal for nearly 10 years. We can't be entirely sure how the licensing process will eventually play out, because no one has submitted an application for a design yet, but there are no substantive differences between the current process for approval and one that would be acceptable for an SMR. William Madia, who was the laboratory director at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, writes, since SMRs are based on proven and licensed components and are passively safe, we should not expect licensing issues. Finally, the status quo provides a simple test case for whether the 2010 Memorandum of Understanding that they're referencing was a success. Has there been a single SMR built since then? No. Look, we all seem to agree that DOD possesses a unique ability to commercialize nascent technologies via its test bed programs and its distribution channels that are already in place. The only remaining question is whether they should lead or follow. We say lead. Thank you. So you say the test of a Memorandum of Understanding from three years ago is whether we've built an SMR now. Your claim is that the licensing for four to six years that the process of constructing a domestic SMR base takes around 10 to 20. Why is that our test for whether or not the DOE's efforts are effective? I'm merely making the simple observation that a Memorandum of Understanding nuclear reactors does not build. And I think that's congruent with every... But the funding might... Sorry? I said, but the funding might... Well, the funding for these DOE loans wasn't allocated by Congress until much later, and it was announced that it would not distribute it until only a couple months ago. Right, so they haven't yet built one. I guess my next question is, you say that the enrichment and reprocessing components of SMRs are the reason why it's more proliferation safe, right? Does that mean the United States would enrich and reprocess for every country that it ships an SMR to? I don't think that that's a determination that we have to defend as a component of our advantage. That's not a reason SMRs are bad. I'm not trying to say it's a reason they're bad. I was just curious about that process, right? You've said that countries like China, Russia, et cetera, should not be the ones to lead this element. You've isolated that ENR is an important component of why it's safe. I'm just curious if those countries are not enriching and reprocessing who is? Our argument is about motivation and economic incentives as well as available opportunities. All of these things contribute to norms. Where those ENR capabilities end up residing, we agree is largely not going to be changed by one reactor being in one geographic location rather than another. But we also think that the international non-proliferation standards and whether they're effective are dependent on more than just counting up the kilograms of uranium in any given spot at any given time. I want to talk about your response to the microgrids component of our grid response. You would agree that the Seder evidence makes a claim both that microgrids are effective for deploying in war zones are cost effective, have an impact on energy assurance. You would agree that they would be sufficient to resolve that concern if the DoD was investing more? If they worked exactly like Seder thinks they would then probably. Okay. But they haven't been deployed so we can't really know. Well that evidence says they haven't been funded fully. You then assert that those are intermittent and that they wouldn't be able to back that up. Do you agree? I guess I'm just curious. Is that just like diesel isn't proven as a fuel type? I was curious what that argument was. No, my argument's not that diesel's intermittent. It's that a backup generator on a base is it limited by the gallons of diesel present in cross examination. Markov clarified that you also would like the department to install renewable facilities for bases. All of this I think means that a lot of the cost problems that the military is going to run into would not be the result of SMRs. They would be the result of flawed grid policies in the past. I'm not going to repeat the thanks but Payton kind of already said it all. So we believe the downsides of the Department of Defense leading in the development of small modular nuclear reactors outweigh the potential benefits that Georgetown has discussed in this debate. The primary issue is cost. Georgetown correctly points out that current military purchases from the civilian grid do put pressure on DoD budgets. But that is insignificant when compared to the price of massive SMR development in the short term. Also, given the long timeframe for SMR development, the cross-ex of the first speech indicated decades, the DoD would be stuck footing the bill for both civilian electricity now in addition to new reactors at the expense of other important programs. While Cochrane may discuss concrete costs, he is by no means equating concrete with total cost. He also discusses costs from things like emergency management and being a first mover and the unique expenses that come with that, which Georgetown has conveniently disregarded in their last speech. Taking on the first mover role requires things like extra testing and demonstration costs in addition to the typical safety licensing and waste management overhead that we've discussed previously. Even if SMR seem economically reasonable on their own, Georgetown has failed to take into account the current economic environment where cost minimization is necessary to ensure military effectiveness due to sequestration. You should ask yourself, do we actually need a few new possibly unnecessary reactors if they come at the expense of our troops' readiness abroad? The impact of this tradeoff should outweigh the marginal benefits that SMRs provide in the long term. In terms of waste, they too quickly dismiss a very serious issue. The belief that SMR development could alter political gridlock seems unlikely and could be achieved by civilian development. Similarly, it is definitely too early to start discussing a waste-consuming SMR given the timeframe for a light solution, maybe decades, as they say. Our point is not centered upon the need for a separate waste storage facility, but rather the necessity to avoid furthering waste buildup and absent some plan for future generations. Yes, we agree that dry-cast storage is temporary and a solution, but given massive SMR expansion and commercialization as they advocate, we have to be ready for the potential problems that arise and not come into SMR development without a plan. Additionally, they misunderstand our safety argument. It isn't about others acquiring nuclear material, but rather unknown actors creating catastrophic damage through reactor attacks and meltdowns. While attacks haven't happened in the past, the new high-impact location placement could make these SMRs targets. While historically the military has worked with SMRs, our argument is that there is not much common experience in terms of what the military has done with SMRs. Their evidence and arguments discuss the 1970s naval program, and we think that this situation is different from the past. Marcus King, cited by Payton in the first speech, said, quote, regulating power plants as a function that lies beyond DOD's core mission. The military services are unlikely to have personnel with sufficient expertise. This combined with licensing hurdles, such as institutional bias towards large reactors mean that even if the pathway is cleared, the projects could take decades to come online. Even their own media evidence that is cited in the 2AC concludes by saying the NRC will, quote, still need to address the number of reactor modules any one reactor operator can safely operate and the size of the emergency planning zone, issues that should create doubt in the affirmative position. With the military already recommending against taking a leading role in SMR development, it seems like this is a time where we should listen to the experts. The DOE-DOD risk sharing program provides a slower but safer development route for SMR's that reduces cost and safety issues while still creating benefits down the line. I'll now address Georgetown's benefits. In terms of non-proliferation, they have yet to prove the necessity of military action in this area. The status quo DOE civilian SMR program can be sufficient in achieving the same benefits regarding alternatives to ENR and international influence, especially if it's about the signal we send in terms of commercial development. Also, if SMR-based nuclear leadership can't stop states that are going to nuclearize, then their non-proliferation purpose seems limited in the face of threats like Iran, North Korea, and future adversaries. Regarding ENR, Sheriman Lachman, a senior analyst in foreign policy and security studies at the Institute of Strategic and International Studies said, quote, the overwhelming majority of countries have demonstrated little interest in establishing their own enrichment and reprocessing facilities. Optimism about the U.S. ability to dissuade these countries is also questionable given our previous record of other priorities getting in the way. And in the cross-ex, the idea that the U.S. can enrich and reprocess for all these countries seems unfeasible. Given these points, it seems unlikely that SMR will provide a significant non-proliferation benefit any time soon. In terms of the grid, those concerns are also overstated. Their microgrid evidence is outdated. It's all from 2008. ours says, quote, according to a new report from Pike Research in 2013, the total capacity of DOD microgrids will surpass 600 megawatts by 2018, a 50 percent increase over 2012. Microgrids are proven to work on 40 military installations today with a unique combination of inputs that prevent intermittency and combined with new backup generators, the grid is more resilient than ever and SMRs are unnecessary. Thank you. If I understand you correctly, your argument about the DOE taking the lead assumes that DOD eventually purchases the reactors that are being tested. Am I correct in that? We think that they could possibly do that. Our evidence indicates that if the DOE cost sharing program is successful, the reason they're doing that is for slower, safer, less costly development in the future so the DOD could possibly buy. I understand that. I'm wondering what difference that slower development makes for any of your cost arguments. So our evidence says that one of the main issues with cost is taking a first mover role. We believe that the first mover role would create issues such as extra testing, extra demonstration that could more safely and securely be done by a gradual development by the Department of Energy. I guess the place where I'm confused is that your Cochran evidence we both agree makes arguments about concrete scaling and distribution of emergency response units. I don't understand how the Department of Energy program causing slower development later changes that cost structure. You're right. There are still going to be costs. Our argument is the degree of cost would be mitigated by not taking a first mover role. Okeydoke, your Cunningham evidence, the card that says there's a waste problem with SMRs says that the Blue Ribbon Commission's recommendations are the best way forward on this issue. Are there any indications that any of their recommendations are moving forward on the hill? I mean probably not based on what's happening on the hill. But our point is more simple than just do we need to do that specific recommendation. It's rather we should have a plan before a massive expansion of SMRs. We're not sure exactly what the right recommendation is or if the hill or people on the hill will accept the Blue Ribbon. But it's a question of should we just start continuing the pile up waste in a temporary solution that we're not sure will last 15, 20 years down the line? That makes some sense. So you're emphasizing the meltdowns component of the next evidence now rather than the terrorism component if I understood you correctly. I'm wondering if you can give me an example of a deleterious impact to anyone that resulted from a meltdown in the U.S. There might not have been a meltdown in the U.S. that has had a large impact. Our point is a broad expansion and a rushed expansion possibly through the DOD can have problems in terms of safety. Okay. Your AMON evidence, the micro grids from Pike Research. Correct me if I'm wrong, but he's the individual in charge of that program, right? I would have to look up but maybe that wasn't the first speech. My only concern is that it seems like he's announcing the micro grids program to the press. Is there account of the number of bases on which this has been successfully deployed and tested? That evidence talks about 40 bases in the U.S. having it successfully deployed. Thank you guys. That's the end of the first part of the debate. We'll turn it over to our expert judges for some questions for the debaters and then we'll turn it over to you all. I'm going to start with Scott maybe and be sure to use the microphones. Okay, sure. I just want to say real quick that Scott's notes over here are absolutely amazing in terms of just how he's been following your debates. You need to give this to the class afterwards. Well, I'm going to tell you that for the most of the people that are in the audience recognize this note taking and know it for the fraud that it is, but thanks Tom. Okay. A question for both the affirmative and for the negative. It seems to me that on the question of who's the better first mover, the DOE, commercialization program, or DOD as a first mover in this specific case, the evidence that comes that suggests DOD has a unique talent or skill at first mover comes from the DOD in the first speech and the evidence that suggests the DOE is better comes from the DOE. I can, being a Washington creature myself, I can certainly understand particularly I believe as one of you said in times of sequestration and tight budgets why people are fond of their own programs. Is there any evidence that suggests, and this is on the, not on SMRs as a general proposition, a narrow question of who should be the first mover that doesn't come from the DOD or in the case of the DOE that doesn't come from the DOE. Have we heard any in this debate? So there are sort of two separate questions that I heard. One is whether this evidence exists and the second is whether you've heard it in this debate. I guess I'll respond to the first for sort of general knowledge purposes but yes there are people at the National War College as well as several independent reports that have substantiated both the DOD first mover and the DOE first mover arguments as far as- Let me interrupt you. The National War College, can anybody apply to that? Is that a, they have like a football team or something? Okay, well I'm assuming that's part of the same defense operation as far as independent studies whether the DOE is the better first mover. Are they so independent that they were funded independently or might these be questions that the DOD themselves asked? I would leave that question to the negative. Okay. If one thing if I could chime in though and sort of a large part of the literature written about DOD first mover on SMR is that the DOD is an effective first mover so you have multiple instances in the last few decades of DOD adopting technology and then disseminating it to the public space. Really can you name another? The internet is probably the biggest example. Okay, very good. Obviously there's like medical advances penicillin is one that people know about semiconductor. I think the concern in the literature is more broadly so most of the evidence I've seen at least talks about the DOD in the context of SMRs but in terms of the first mover role the DOD becomes a debate about whether or not a particular type picking a winner is the better approach or letting it develop sort of more competitively without guaranteeing the market of the DOD and so And the DOE is better at that. So that's the back and forth I have seen less evidence that compares the DOD as a first mover versus the DOE I have seen evidence about the DOD as a first mover creating lock in that's worse for the market or Is literature disclose anything about the odd error the DOE might make the first mover? Yeah, the funding of an energy project that didn't work out so well. Sure, I think there have been some. Heard tell a bit. Let me see what these other learned gentlemen say. I'll just follow on Scott's question because it seems that one of the arguments is that DOE should be the first mover and not DOD and yet one of the supporting evidences in times of sequestration we shouldn't be putting this type of onus on DOD but it all comes from the same checkbook whether it's at the Department of Energy or whether it's at the Department of Defense So I guess my question is why do you care whether it's coming out of DOE or DOD if it's a concern about spending? So I would say part of our contention for that is whether or not SMR development will occur the DOD funding and sort of the affirmative that they've presented would procure those for bases across the United States. The idea behind the DOE current funding is that they're attempting to sort of kickstart an industry that then develops them which I think will be a less of a financial investment than buying a bunch of the SMRs for all of the different phases if that makes any sense. DOE is doing under an MOU with DOD is trying to develop a program that would commercialize SMRs for So the memorandum of understanding is about the way the interaction happens, the actual budget allocations that they've talked about is for giving money to those companies that have designed them Who's the target audience in terms of who would buy these SMRs, whether it's developed from this DOE program? Those I think are initially commercial development of SMRs Let's talk about the concern that SMRs represent a military target or an additional target So right now we've got roughly 100 small reactors that are operated by the Navy I think it's on roughly 85 ships Those ships aren't always out at sea They're at port somewhere So you have already I'm assuming those military bases are already potential targets with small reactors on ships With the public that's accustomed to having those nuclear reactors that they can see on those ships Maybe they can't see the reactors but they can see the ships So therefore the question is if we're looking at deployment on let's say those military bases where people are already accustomed to having them present does that alleviate some of your concerns about them adding on to the military target? I think it may but our bigger concern I think is the broad expansion in terms of every base or many in terms of isolating them from the grid in terms of doing that to resolve some of Georgetown's concerns it seems like it would be a much larger expansion than the current docking of Navy ships with military bases and our argument also comes from the expertise side It is true that there's a nuclear Navy program we don't dispute that but our question is with a massive expansion is there the DOD workforce and expertise still available that can deal with that expansion successfully regulated That raises another question That raises another question I haven't seen any literature that suggests that we should drop an SMR on every single military base that we have I think that one reason is because SMR's produce a lot more electricity than say most bases take right and so I think that when you're looking at military bases themselves you have to ask two questions first is there a demand for the electricity right and if there is and the SMR produces more electricity than the demand then the question is what are you going to do with that extra electricity the second piece is what bases do we absolutely have to have separate from the grid because we need that counter strike capability okay so I think that I've lost my thought actually can I ask a I wanted to ask a question based on what they just said let's say because this is debate and debate has a little power we like to call fiat so if they want to put a small modular reactor on every base all they have to do is wave their magic wand and the money gets printed up and off they go let's assume for a moment that you did put an SMR on a base where it generated more electricity than the base required now what would normally happen in a situation like that is you would sell the excess electricity back onto the grid which would then make money does the literature disclose anything about potentially selling electricity back to the grid and raising money that could actually begin to pay for maybe successive generations of either innovation or new deployment the king report that the negative has introduced pieces of to the debate is sort of the most authoritative internal department opinion on this issue and there's a whole subsection that raises that possibility and presents it as a potentially attractive byproduct of this proposal it's not one that we introduced in this debate largely because of of time constraints but hypothetically the sale of excess power would be net profitable they're arguing spending might that not have been a place for you to introduce it I hate to critique you I think it also raises the interesting question of ownership so an added component of a lot of that literature is about whether or not that SMR is purchased and run by the military on the base or whether or not private utility companies locate close by guaranteed that the military base has power and sell to the civilian grid which is obviously a layer that we didn't talk about they don't even have to locate close by it is possible for them to own and operate in fact real world just for a moment probably in many cases there would be a contract with a civilian company that would run at least I hope they wouldn't be taking grunts fresh out of Paris Island and having them operate a nuclear power plant no matter how small so there probably would be licensed professionals that would be running the plant it's more likely that you have unlike the nuclear navy it's more likely that you have a public-private partnership where utility operates the SMR for example and you have a purchase power agreement associated with all that well the most of the civilian fleet is run by former nuclear navy operators so they do have the expertise and just to kind of follow on David's point I would say that DOD has interest beyond costs in terms of how they evaluate technologies and deploying them and one being readiness and preparedness and not how much it costs is irrelevant if it's we need this for counter-strike possibilities for the Andrews I have a question about the in your initial speech you talked about DOD having this proven track record and DOE not and I would just ask the question about DOD's proven track record with the nuclear weapons complex and specifically Hanford site which currently has a number of nuclear waste tanks that are buried but are now leaking and they're trying to figure out where to send them and who to manage it and how to deal with it because of the way that DOD has managed the nuclear weapons complex was blow it up now we'll clean it up later and trying to figure out is that the proven track record that we really want from an environmental management perspective that's a great question I think it is possible to draw a separation between some of the mistakes of the past and what we're advocating and I think there are sort of two answers to your question that sort of address it had on first is SMR's by design are built in a way that they can store their own waste that they largely are self-contained plus in terms of civilian nuclear waste even if that weren't the case there's dry cask storage on site storage and those technologies have been proven so the DOD wouldn't take its hand for an approach or we hope and think it wouldn't take its hand for an approach build them into SMR's that already have more effective means of dealing with waste and second I think the sort of converse to that is you know the DOE at the same time hasn't shown its expertise in terms of being able to engage the market so even with those downsides we still think if SMR's are desirable if they can eventually generate either political momentum or technical solution to waste that only the DOD could carry through with its signal to the market do we know how expensive micro grids are to deploy like on a per base basis I don't think our evidence specifically speaks to that truthfully the evidence just says that there are 40 places that it's being demonstrated now with many more projects to come so I'm assuming it's already part of the budget for what the DOD is planning and that's what our evidence that discusses them acting on the defense science board like the 2008 review and ramping up the backup generators as well as micro grids discusses so but if I'm understanding what a micro grid is it means like you know a little piece of the grid that's for a particular plant which to me speaks to the virtues of what's called distributed generation that we ought to have a diesel generator a windmill god forbid or natural gas or something that provides your own little piece of the grid but doesn't that admit at least it admits the premise that the deployment of the SMR which is itself its own little piece of the grid also would have that salutary effect on the stability of the grid I mean do you agree with that I mean the deploying SMRs would isolate these from the civilian grid and provide that option because an advanced micro grid it's the outcome and what's powering it is irrelevant right it's whether it's a windmill or an SMR it's all trying to provide the island aspect of the complex but having said that one of the questions one of the points that was made about advanced micro grids is that it's quote unproven technology which obviously not unproven technology it's just been unproven but I guess one could say the same thing about an SMR and more stuff the SMR is kind of the hydrogen car of the nuclear industry it's always ten years away no matter what year it is and advanced micro grids really the problem with deploying those whatever it is that's powering it it's more of a contracting problem power purchase agreements is kind of more of an issue rather than deciding how you're going to power it or is it what your generation issues are I mean I think for us from our perspective truthfully I would say that it's more of a power generation issue in terms of the sources being put together in a way that has backups and aren't intermittent but the advancements in micro grids with developments like SMART micro grids the spiders project things like that have worked on technological side so that does bring up the point of how is the best way to develop them and our evidence on our side of this debate says that the DOD is steadfastly working towards that solution in terms of micro grids and is on a positive track in terms of having the technology and knowing kind of the right places to use solar on which bases versus wind as the backup and making sure it's not a top down approach but rather a case by case for different bases you know it strikes me we never offer to our thanks so as a guy in the middle I want to make sure that thanks meet thanks and I also want to formally accept the thanks that was offered so thank you for your thanks alright guys well to continue the tradition of thanks thanks for the questions I think we're going to move on to the audience Q&A portion of the session we've got Adrian someone whose name I embarrassingly don't know who both have microphones so if you could just raise your hand I'll call on you someone will bring you a microphone just identify yourself give your name and your affiliation and then we'll go from there so start right here thank you Stephen Dolly I'm a reporter covering nuclear energy for PLATS and Fair Disclosure a former college debate contemporary of Mr. Siegel back in the late place of the senior year having survived my fair share of non-proliferation debates both in Washington and in academia I'm hoping to unpack a little bit what the scenario is for how an invigorated US SMR domestic base would enhance US influence over non-proliferation as you all know and as most people in the room know there's just a huge number of ways in which the literature discusses how the US domestic nuclear industry might positively or negatively influence the risk of nuclear weapons proliferation it seems like in this debate what you're primarily saying is that if there were a strong US SMR sector any nation that just turns up its nose at an offer of a US SMR would flag itself for the international community as a potential proliferant it seems like the first question there is doesn't that necessarily assume therefore that the US would be supplying the fuel and perhaps reprocessing services for the SMRs and if that were the case why would a potential proliferant nation want to enter into an agreement to buy an SMR from us as opposed to Russia, China or these other countries and secondly there was a second aspect to that in terms of the influence you know how much influence does the the enrichment and reprocessing aspect of that have in a decision as to who you would want to buy your nuclear power plant from okay so there are primarily two routes to effective non-proliferation impacts to SMRs that are discussed in the literature the first is related to the reactor itself and there's a phrase used called cradle-degrade effectiveness where as a self-contained unit that is operated and monitored by the private company that developed the reactor it would be abundantly clear if the materials or the waste that resulted or even the processes were captured and taken from that reactor now the second component of the question is why is the U.S. tied to any of that why isn't that just a function of the reactor and the second component is largely a norms-based argument so the U.S. has different diplomatic priorities we think than other countries who would offer those reactors so while the influence component of a strong nuclear domestic industry might not be intrinsically tied to the physical reactor the two in conjunction are uniquely beneficial and just to follow up real quickly not to get too wonky but as you may know the SMR designs that are nearest to commercial fruition are not cradle-degrade those are subsequent designs down the line from I don't remember what they're called now they used to be called Hyperion and people like that and maybe even some of the generation four designs you talk about the LWR SMRs that are being considered in the U.S. right now are not cradle-degrade and would need to be refueled and something would need to be done with their spent fuel so there is a consideration there totally any other questions so I have two questions my name is Larry Meinert I'm the head of the mental resources program of the United States Geological Survey the listed question for debate is the United States should commit to revitalizing its nuclear power industry nowhere in here to say anything about nuclear reactors so my first question is what the heck are we focusing on that only one small piece of the nuclear industry and why are you saying that that is the only possible way forward number two assuming we are going to go forward in that direction if we do simple mathematics if we have small reactors that are let's say for the sake of argument one tenth the size of a regular reactor that means for the same capacity ten of those for every one sort of normal size plant which means that we now have ten exposures for potential disasters like happened in Japan where apparently unforeseen earthquake tsunami caused a huge disaster so it seemed like the calculus of having ten times more exposure to plants gives us a risk that would not be there with larger plants great question so to answer the first part of sort of why SMR versus the broader industry you know our contention is that SMRs are the way forward for the industry so we have a class of LWRs that are outdated that are falling behind technologically to other countries that are developing either pushing for generation 4 SMRs, new LWR designs that are safer, that are cheaper and they are being subsidized by those governments and we think that sort of relying on existing technology can't get the job done with the DOD it doesn't have the potential to be cradle to the grave at some point in the future which we think is important for nonproliferation and so SMRs plus we think that SMRs are sort of inherently safer because they are smaller because they have passive safety and so they represent a move that we think ameliorates most of the problems with nuclear power as it exists now and we do think that there is a potential for a robust industry to be built around them to answer the second part of your question I think a lot of the SMR studies that we've read throughout the course of this year can test the characterization of the 10 times as much risk and one thing we haven't talked about yet but is in this report by Kessides from the World Bank that we read is that when you the way SMRs would be rolled out assuming there were a vibrant industry was that you would build an SMR cluster so you would have a single containment unit a single waste repository etc. a single set of security measures a single external wall etc and then you would build in units within that so that's a way to solve the scale problem without having to you don't have like an SMR here and SMR here and SMR here they're sort of clamped together with one central control system for safety the other thing is sort of this passive safety argument that we've been discussing a lot Fukushima meltdown that you referred to you know a more traditional large reactor design and an SMR is less prone to those sort of shocks it's much faster cooling off and the self-containment aspects we think reduce the risk of that being catastrophic in the US for those of you who didn't debate in the audience I also just want to take judges prerogative to add one more thing to the answer to question one it probably does sound a little tinny because you know we have a major deployment of nukes right now in light water reactors and traditional and there are other recommendations for addressing the current fleet the reason I'm taking the judges prerogative for a moment is because in debate we have a convention of proof by example typically what will happen is a resolution which is being debated or a topic is broad in nature to encourage as much cross fertilization and thinking and innovation within the particular year so by convention we allow the teams the affirmative team who specifies what will be debated in the particular round to debate an example of the resolution even though for formal logic reasons a single example doesn't prove a larger resolution we kind of with a wink and a nod allow that as a convention and competitive debate and you're seeing that I think most excellently is that a word on display here where there's a deep dive on a particular example rather than trying to grapple with the entire resolution so that's kind of what's going on I think we've got time for one final question My name is Yong Eun Jung and I used to train in the Korean APC company which is the 5th exporter of the nuclear power plant my question is do the US have enough resources for construction nuclear power plants such as SMR because if you do not have any resources then you have to import from the other country then it will be the cost will be higher it will be skyrocket just to clarify uranium resources or manufacturing capacity or both are we talking about uranium or manufacturing capacity I mean I think we're fortunate to have someone from the geologic survey here but their most recent reports indicate that there's in excess of 100 to 150 years of uranium capacity in the domestic United States that's readily available for mining even under their higher of three scenario planning trajectories for nuclear expansion in the future I don't have a citation for that right in front of me but I'm fairly confident in a similar appraisal to that I don't want to specify a statistic alright well thank you guys I'm going to begin the last component of our debate where each team will have an opportunity to advance their final concluding remarks so I'll turn it back over to Andrew Markoff for a second time okay so to conclude this debate I think we have to ask ourselves one sort of broad question negative is present arguments about how much it would cost to build SMRs maybe a small risk that there will be more waste we think very marginal risk for some sort of safety malfunction setting that aside for a second we've made the argument that DOD's assets are vulnerable to blackouts and we're talking about not just sort of some assets some least important ones basically all of them run out of the United States we're talking about command and control of US military forces that span the globe the ability to control United States nuclear weapons the ability to create points of contact and intelligence these are critical capabilities and our argument isn't that they'll all collapse at once it's not a doomsday scenario but if O3 demonstrates anything it's that a squirrel running into a power line or a cyber attack which our evidence says the attempts at cyber probing are increasing rapidly could bring down a large majority of the system now they say the cost might be too high for the DOD but ask yourself how could the cost be higher than a base going off the grid for an extended period of time global nuclear power I think we all agree is being built out now but there aren't safety precautions only a new US domestic industry builds in safety precautions it prevents blackouts in the future it prevents meltdowns in the future it creates a new series of module reactors suitable for small country electric grids that can be exported to improve global safety so if safety and waste are your concerns US leadership is better than the leadership of a different country the question is follow or lead to talk about the grid the Seder piece of evidence that Arsh read in the 2AC says that the DOD consistently overstates their case and I think we've heard a lot about this DOD evidence people who write for the DOD such as Amon who they read say the microgrids are working fine now our evidence says they're not being built out fast enough and that SMRs provide the only sufficient baseload power generation for a base consider everything that has to be done on a base we're talking about global intelligence nuclear weapons the ability to keep command and control over the globe now think about what other microgrids run on we know renewables are intermittent the sun doesn't always shine the wind doesn't always blow we know fossil fuels are being regulated out of existence and we know diesel isn't really enough small operations perhaps but for the entire US military probably not they raise questions of cost microgrid spending is happening now the DOD and DOE are spending tons of money, public money in spite of sequestration to either build out SMRs to procure biofuels for the military the question is what's the most effective path forward we don't think there's a huge impact to more spending because the DOE is trying but it's a question of scale as well as the Kessities World Bank report that says that SMRs get cheaper as they're built out so even if it's a long term commitment those costs fall as standardization results in factory construction they say we've conveniently disregard other costs they've disregard our economies of multiples argument the one from Kessities that I explained already they say sequestration means that there's a precarious spot for the military and we agree but what is more precarious than a grid blackout that brings down military operations on the question of waste excuse me you should ask yourself do you think that the United States is incapable of coming to either a political or technological solution for waste we think no but the political sclerosis on the issue is largely the result of there not being a strong domestic industry supply meets demand something like yucca mountain more efficient dry cask storage even generation 4 solutions would be built and it's ridiculous to assert that waste is a short term problem multiple decades even if it requires multiple decades a solution can be found on questions of safety I think the negative is largely retreated from their ridiculous claim that a U.S. military base would be attacked with an SMR on it we know that that's almost impossible the question of whether an SMR would melt down we would wager first that we have 104 LWRs so that's not something that we would increase the risk of a ton but also that SMRs are safer they have passive safety systems they're more earthquake resistant another Fukushima is more unlikely if we make our technology better they make arguments about licensing the Medea piece of evidence from Medea that Arstrad which is a study about NRC licensing in the SMR context says that they need to assure that they're safe sure but it's also a question of will it be more difficult to license SMRs and that evidence is quite good at saying the safety concerns are even smaller so the licensing process should be faster they say the DOE can be a first mover they've only allocated 500 million which isn't even really enough to create a successful demonstration and if that not enough to plug into the grid look SMRs will be built in some countries nuclear power will be built everywhere but the question is does the US stand behind as its grid gets more brittle and more vulnerable and as other countries dictate proliferation norms or does it take the lead the DOD is the only capable branch of the government that can take the lead in this regard and so there's simply no alternative thank you we'll begin by saying that as a framing point we are college students the DOD was asked to evaluate its grid vulnerabilities in 2008 and has taken action to move forward and address those issues the DOD was asked to evaluate the use of nuclear on its bases domestically in 2010 and responded by saying it did not want to be the first mover on nuclear development that instead it thought the DOE and further investments were necessary because of issues like first of a kind costs yes funding something is an important component yes spending is occurring now for microgrids but funding an investment in technology that uses status quo energy efforts to upgrade our systems is very different than the DOD being the first mover on a major new initiative on developing a widespread SMR deployment and procuring those for what they have described as almost every base in the United States due to vulnerabilities that massive increase in funding will not I don't think involve a lot of new funding from Congress if anything is indicated by the past few months but instead will involve trade-offs between other major missions those choices are already being forced on the DOD by cuts from sequestration forcing millions of dollars of investment in SMRs in the status quo is a dangerous choice to make if it is true that our DOD infrastructure is so dangerous they are taking action to resolve it the second component of this is waste and safety we can cross our fingers and hope that Congress overcomes the gridlock on waste but why should we wait and do that after it has become an even more dramatic problem waste will expand if the military uses an SMR on every base in the United States the amount of waste developed massively expands yes we have some components that are short term fixes but asking any experts a lot of those are not guaranteed for a particularly long period of time and that only will be possible yes safety of bases is something that we would like to take for granted but there are unknown reasons why meltdowns could possibly occur SMRs might have advanced safety features but the heightened risk of a meltdown occurring on a base whether that's an intentional attack or an accidental meltdown that no one could have predicted those costs are far higher and not worth the risk particularly when status quo efforts are being deployed that are effective in regards to their advance of offense they've made two claims proliferation and grid safety the proliferation component I find a stretch of the imagination yes US leadership in the context of norms is important in affecting the way that countries make decisions but whether or not we own and produce SMRs has very little influence on other countries motivations for proliferating in a dangerous manner I'm unclear what country will decide not to proliferate in a dangerous way because the United States has built a new type of nuclear reactor if it's a question of the safety features that are included in an SMR they have yet to address who does the enrichment who does the reprocessing the current SMR models are not cradle to grave they are nuclear material being spread internationally and if it's only a model question then why are the 15 other countries that are developing SMRs not sufficient the US is not a hubris of asserting that the United States is the only one capable of establishing safety standards is laughable and unfounded in the evidence that they've cited the second component of this is the grid they have cited nothing after the 2008 report that says that the grid for the military is still vulnerable the idea that every base in the United States is shut down which is his explanation for this catastrophic impact that is to exist is highly improbable at best small scale blackouts in certain regions cut off one base maybe we haven't seen it for decades we haven't seen the consequences of it for decades what we have seen is an expansion since 2008 of microgrids the investment in things like diesel renewables etc are all resolutions to the problem that they have isolated it's unclear to me why their evidence concludes that microgrids are sufficiently effective should be preferred maybe it's true that the DOD needs to invest further in microgrids that might be an alternate proposal that resolves the component of SMRs but it is certainly not true that SMRs are the only solution to the DOD's current vulnerabilities and given the massive costs and dangers associated with those they're certainly not the solution we should endorse well thank you guys it occurs to me to mention that it's exam period for all of these debaters so I do really appreciate that they're willing to put in the time to come up with these arguments and stuff and I think that your applause is well deserved so we're going to turn it back over to the judges for another few minutes of comments about the debate well first of all I want legitimately and without tongue planted firmly in shake I want to thank you guys for presenting an example of what college debate can really be this was analytical it showed a tremendous familiarity with the underlying literature and when you weren't grounding your arguments in the underlying literature you made it up with a plum and that too prepares you for a life and career here in Washington DC so no in all seriousness this was just marvelous and it's really what I see and for those of you who don't know I spend some time as a debate coach and I also spend some time as a administrator to the national tournament and I wish every college administrator in the country who faces their own sequestration battle about what extracurricular activities to fund could see this when they think about what kind of a role debate plays in the marketplace of ideas in their own community because it'd be a great situation okay enough of the easy stuff I would have frankly from the negative would have liked to have seen more discussion about what to do and what the nature is and what the alternatives are to smr's what to do with the existing nuclear fleet now you don't as I as I've noted a moment ago no one has an obligation to defend light water reactors under the terms of debate convention here however as a negative you begin in the micro grids debate to discuss well smr seems like a very expensive way to address the particular issues at play here so for example more discussion of what a micro micro grid constitutes more of a comparison of distributed generation to centralized generation we do have this existing fleet of large expensive nuclear power plants that have some of the same benefits the affirmative is talking about it would have been nice to hear about what other innovations aside from making a lot of little nuclear plants there might be it may be that smr's is the best but there are certainly any true policy analysis of smr's would have to begin with what are we giving up to move in that direction I like the strategy employed by both the negative and the affirmative on the issues as debated I will say one thing the notion is if I understand it correctly we don't actually even have to build an smr in order to get the proliferation advantage all we have to do is say we're going to build an smr and signal to the marketplace and everyone on God's green earth that there will be a next generation of smr's even the DOE can do that right so if it's true that mere signaling is enough to achieve the proliferation advantage as a tactical matter you don't have to win that the DOE is capable of actually cutting a check and actually building something you just have to win that they're capable of issuing a press release which those of us who work in Washington know they are very capable of doing right so just a little bit there I know you're caging on the location of reprocessing but it almost sounds to the audience and to me as a judge like there's a whole second debate going on about reprocessing that we're not getting to hear and it does seem to me to be quite critical particularly when you're placing the smr in the context of reprocessing so either have that debate or figure out a better way to not have that debate as my advice as a coach last item is on the waste issue for me we make an assumption that the waste will always be kept on site and stored in secure casks which is of course what conventional nuclear power plants are forced to do or forced to think about we don't know and given the nature of this topic it might not be topical for you to specify but we don't know exactly what decisions the Department of Defense will make in terms of security they are also very good at moving things around in the Department of Defense in fact probably most of what DOD does is engage in logistics they may well decide to move waste around particularly if there's a massive deployment on their basis what are the implications one it might force the construction of Yucca Mountain it might force the construction of some other military issue number two they don't have a particularly good track record as far as waste storage is concerned at centralized locations CEG Waller's discussion of Hanford right or number three they might provide greater targets even though they're better at moving things around than the civilian industry would be potentially to moving things to Yucca there's a whole other debate there that's the substructure of the waste debate seems to be missing here because of time I mean it's not missing because you didn't think it was a waste but I think it's worth faring out some of those issues for folks that are listening and that's more than enough Dave Tom I'll pair it Scott's statement just about just how invigorating a conversation this was and I appreciate the opportunity to kind of hear as you all have developed your arguments and not being a debater I appreciate you kind of explaining why were you talking about and with my time on the Hill and all the issues with the civilian nuclear fleet the nuclear debate has pretty much been a very binary debate it's a yes or no question you're debating should we do nuclear or should we not and this was more of a discussion it was both of y'all are essentially saying yes and it was a question of who should be doing it and I would have enjoyed more of a conversation of why and why should do you do or why should do we kind of talked about or why should we do it at all as a conversation and and for the negative I thought that the discussion about the advanced microgrids was kind of the that was the way to go right that were that you've got all these these programs in place for DOE to set up these islands and even just an explanation of how much you would cost to deploy wind with backup battery power and maybe even with the backup diesel if you want to have redundancies compare that to the cost of a theoretical SMR and you probably would win that very often renewables have a hard time discussing battling the battle of costs but nuclear makes that pretty easy to fight that right now and the both of you all kind of enjoyed the tyranny of the hypothetical going after the other the what if blackouts and so we have to have these things to battle against some sort of huge grid failure or the what if meltdowns what if we have all these plants and they all melt down and we can always have plenty of hypothetical what ifs unfortunately Fukushima gave us Japan had a great safety record in its nuclear fleet until it didn't and so that's always something that you have to deal with on waste one of the things again you all brought up as short term fixes and drycast storage is a hundred year fix and when you contemplate the technology advances that we've had in the past hundred years other than the fact that we still dig mud out of the ground and burn it but in plenty of other industries there's been plenty there's been a lot of advancement and one would hope that maybe within a hundred years we can maybe find something to do with with our nuclear waste I'll leave it at that but again I think you guys were fantastic and very impressive thanks yeah you guys did a wonderful job and I certainly concur with my colleagues remarks to follow up on a point that Tom made yeah both sides were talking about first mover or not for DoD or DoE the question is why do we need a first mover right someone has to be a first mover in advancing a new technology or new platform and you know the question is why should it be DoD well first of all I think that if you look at if you look at the domestic energy situation right there are a number of utilities that are certainly interested in SMR deployment and the reason why they're interested in SMR deployment is because there's a lot of regulatory uncertainty regarding EPA emissions I mean EPA regulations regarding greenhouse gases and other pollutants this is something that my colleagues know all too well the issue is if you're a utility right and you think that you're going to get hit by a future EPA regulation that forces you to shut down one or two coal plants in a certain part of your service area then the question is what do you replace it with right you got the president suggesting that the United States needs to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by 2050 what does that mean right assuming that the climate agenda progresses assuming that EPA continues to tighten the standards right natural gas will fall off of that at some point and if you're a utility if you're an investor these projects are going to last 40, 50, 60 years right so you have to be able to sort of deploy you have to deploy a generation source that you anticipate are going to meet those future standards right so given all the regulatory uncertainty given the cost of the SMRs I think both sides did a good job talking about the cost it's necessary for someone to be the first mover to make a solid national security argument as to why we need to protect at least a certain military basis from cyber disruption etc that can provide an order book that sends a signal to the market that will then pour in investment that will drive down cost of deployment but great job thank you all for coming I don't know that we have any more formal programming but I certainly encourage these conversations to continue as you eat what's left of the food and drink what remains of the drink so thank you all for coming