核能供电 | 小型核反应堆为数据中心供电的愿景在加速
小型核反应堆为数据中心供电的愿景在加速
Small Nuclear Reactors Could Power Data Centers Sooner Than You Think
National Data Center
February 3, 2023 Dan Rabb, Bisnow Data Centers Reporter
美国核管会已经批准小型模块化反应堆（SMR）这一军用技术投入商用。中国也已开始推进相关的SMR、60万千瓦级商用高温气冷堆、海上浮动式核动力平台等先进示范堆项目。SMR相较于其他供电设施，占地小、部署更快、可靠性更高、也更环保。SMR今后可以为微电网、海上设施、高耗能数据中心和电网容量有限的偏远地区进行供电。
SMR技术在数据中心行业的应用仍然存在一些挑战，包括：选址及互联网接入点、建造及运行成本、运维技术能力等。由于中国的核电设施运营牌照相比IDC数据中心运营牌照更具有垄断性，如果今后采用SMR为数据中心或园区供电，大概率还是由核电运营方和数据中心运营方独立运营各自设施，或成立合资公司对这些设施进行统一运营管理。
多年来，小型核反应堆为蓬勃发展的数据中心供电，一直被视为一种更可持续的方式。现在，数据中心行业在面临传统能源越来越多的问题时，一系列新的监管批准和项目可能会使数据中心使用核电的方案提前落地。
Small nuclear reactors have been eyed for years as a more sustainable way to power the booming supply of data centers. Now, just as the industry faces growing issues with access to its traditional power sources, a series of new regulatory approvals and projects could make that nuclear future a reality sooner than expected.
美国能源部，NuScale 计划中的 Voygr 发电厂，将使用小型模块化核反应堆
1 月下旬，美国核管会首次全面批准小型模块化反应堆SMR用于商业用途。这是在去年 10 月的一项监管决定之后做出的，该决定允许 SMR 建造在比传统核电站更靠近人口稠密地区的地方。
In late January, for the first time, U.S. nuclear regulators fully approved a small modular reactor for commercial use. That came after an October regulatory decision that allowed SMRs to be built closer to densely populated areas than traditional nuclear plants.
上周，GE Hitachi 和加拿大公用事业公司 Ontario Power Generation 宣布了一个 SMR 发电厂的计划，该发电厂将于 2028 年投入运营，这是北美第一个电网规模 SMR 的商业合同。
And last week, GE Hitachi and Canadian utility Ontario Power Generation announced plans for an SMR power plant that will be operational by 2028, the first commercial contract for a grid-scale SMR in North America.
像 NuScale现在批准的功率模块这样的 SMR 在尺寸和规模上更接近于为海军潜艇和航空母舰提供动力的反应堆，而不是公用事业通常使用的大型核电站。它们的体积小意味着它们只需要旧核电站所需占地面积的一小部分。
SMRs like NuScale’s now-approved Power Module are closer in size and scale to the reactors powering the Navy’s submarines and aircraft carriers than to the massive nuclear generating stations typically used by utilities. Their small size means they require a fraction of the footprint needed for older nuclear plants.
支持者表示，SMR核电站可以比传统核电站更便宜、更快速地建造，并且可以在更多地方建造，而且不会有大规模核泄漏的风险。
Proponents say SMR plants can be built more cheaply, more quickly and in more places than their traditional counterparts, with none of the risk of large-scale environmental catastrophe often associated with nuclear energy.
专家表示，虽然距离第一个商用 NuScale 反应堆还有六年的时间，但模块化核能很可能在数据中心项目中率先得到推广和应用。
Although the first commercial NuScale reactor is still six years away, data centers might well be the use case that brings modular nuclear power into mainstream use, experts say.
数据中心开发商和运营商一直在努力寻找开发地点，以获取该行业最重要市场中这些设施所需的大量电力。与此同时，他们面临着逐步淘汰燃烧化石燃料产生的能源的压力。这很容易理解为什么对于越来越多的行业领导者来说，SMR 越来越像是解决他们两个最大问题的潜在解决方案。
Data center developers and operators have been struggling to find development sites with access to the massive amounts of electricity these facilities need in the sector’s most important markets. At the same time, they are facing pressure to phase out energy generated by burning fossil fuels. It is easy to see why, to a growing cohort of industry leaders, SMRs are looking more and more like a potential solution to two of their biggest problems.
“数据中心是这方面的完美应用，”Omdia 云和数据中心研究实践的首席分析师艾伦霍华德说，他是 12 月关于 SMR 数据中心可行性研究的合著者。
“Data centers are a perfect application for this,” said Alan Howard, principal analyst at Omdia’s cloud and data center research practice and the co-author of a December study on SMRs' viability for data centers.
“突然之间，因为NuScale 取得了进展，并且还有许多其他项目正在进行中，人们开始真正谈论这个，”霍华德补充道。“这是一件大事，它正在开始发展和验证、通过可靠性和经济分析后才会开始推广应用。”
“All of a sudden, because NuScale has made progress and there’s a bunch of other projects in the works, people are starting to really talk about this," Howard added. "It’s a big deal, and it’s starting the process of developing the proof, the economic data and the use cases needed to bring it into the mainstream.”
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小型反应堆并不是一项新技术。第一艘核动力军舰于 1955 年下水，俄罗斯使用 SMR 为北极圈的农村社区提供电力。但只是在过去十年内，NuScale、劳斯莱斯、东芝和特里斯特尔能源等公司才开始在小型反应堆方面取得重大进展，这些反应堆的生产成本足够低，而且规模足够大，具有商业可行性。
Small reactors aren’t exactly a new technology. The first nuclear-powered warship launched in 1955, and Russia uses an SMR to provide power to rural communities in the Arctic Circle. But it is only within the past decade that companies like NuScale, Rolls Royce, Toshiba and Terrestrial Energy began making serious strides toward small reactors that can be produced cheaply enough and at enough scale to be commercially viable.
核管会上个月批准的NuScale 反应堆可产生约 50 兆瓦的电力。这比最大的数据中心园区使用的能源要少，尽管多达 12 个模块可以组合在一起作为一个电源，可以为北弗吉尼亚以外的任何市场的所有数据中心提供足够的电力。每个模块长 76 英尺，宽 15 英尺，这意味着具有多个反应器的工厂可以安置在比标准数据中心更小的建筑物中。
The NuScale reactor approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission last month produces around 50 megawatts of power. That is less energy than is used by the largest data center campuses, although up to 12 of the modules can be grouped together as a single power source that could provide more than enough electricity for all the data centers in any market except Northern Virginia. Each module is 76 feet long by 15 feet wide, meaning that plants with multiple reactors can be housed in buildings smaller than the standard data center.
能够以较小的占地面积产生大量的电力能力是 SMR 对数据中心的吸引力的核心。
该公司表示，NuScale的发电厂设计可以在仅 0.05 平方英里的土地上产生 924 兆瓦的电力，而即使是最小的传统核电站也超过 1 平方英里，风电场也超过 94 平方英里。虽然针对传统核电站的联邦法规要求在周围建立一个灾难管理区，以防止它们在人口稠密地区附近建造，但 10 月的一项监管决定确定 SMR 的应急区仅限于电站本身，从而大大增加了可以建造这些设施的地方。
The ability to generate lots of power on a small footprint is at the heart of SMRs' appeal for data centers. NuScale’s power plant design can produce 924 MW on just 0.05 square miles, the company says, compared with more than 1 square mile for even the smallest traditional nuclear plant or 94 square miles for a wind farm. And while federal regulations for traditional nuclear plants mandate a surrounding disaster management zone that prevents them from being constructed next to densely populated areas, an October regulatory decision determined that the emergency zone for SMRs is limited to the plant site itself, vastly increasing the number of places these facilities can be built.
在美国日本和英国等地，这种政府对SMR技术的支持有助于使 SMR 更接近商业可行性。自 2014 年以来，美国能源部已向 NuScale 和其他 SMR 项目投入超过 6 亿美元，并将成为 NuScale 反应堆产生的能源的第一个客户。第一个商业 NuScale 发电厂计划于 2029 年上线，将由犹他州的一家公用事业公司运营，为能源部的爱达荷国家实验室提供能源。
This kind of government support for modular nuclear technology in the U.S. and in places like Japan and the UK has been instrumental in moving SMRs closer to commercial viability.The Department of Energy has pumped more than $600M into NuScale and other SMR projects since 2014 and will be the first customer for the energy produced by NuScale’s reactors. Scheduled to go online in 2029, the first commercial NuScale power plant will be operated by a Utah utility to provide energy for the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory.
“SMR 不再是一个抽象概念，”负责核能的助理部长 Kathryn Huff 在一份书面声明中表示。“它们是真实的，并已准备好部署”。对于数据中心开发商和运营商而言，SMR 为限制北弗吉尼亚和硅谷等主要市场发展的电力限制提供了一种潜在的补救措施。
“SMRs are no longer an abstract concept,” Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy Kathryn Huff said in a written statement. “They are real, and they are ready for deployment.”For data center developers and operators, SMRs offer a potential remedy to the power constraints that have limited development in key markets like Northern Virginia and Silicon Valley.
在弗吉尼亚州的劳登县等地，问题不是发电量太少，而是输电基础设施不足，无法将电力从中央发电厂输送到数据中心建设者需要的光纤和其他设施。SMR 提供了另一种方法的可能性：将发电转移到数据中心所在的地方。
In places like Virginia’s Loudoun County, the problem hasn't been too little power being generated but rather insufficient transmission infrastructure bringing electricity from central power plants to sites with access to fiber and other features data center builders need. SMRs present the possibility of an alternative approach: Move the power generation to where the data centers are.
传统的核电站比SMR大得多，成本更高，建造时间更长
专家表示，这种方法现在更有意义，因为数据中心越来越多地在大型、多设施园区中发展，而且它们经常聚集在靠近其他数据中心运营商或其他电力密集型行业（如芯片制造厂或高科技制造业）的地方。
Experts say this approach makes even more sense now that data centers are increasingly developed on large, multifacility campuses, and they are frequently clustered close to other data center operators or other power-intensive industries like chip fabrication plants or high-tech manufacturing.
Omdia 的霍华德说：“看看内华达州的斯帕克斯，那里有特斯拉工厂，他们在那里生产电池，然后几乎在投掷距离之内就有谷歌数据中心园区、苹果数据中心园区和 Switch 数据中心园区。” “这将是这种技术真正适用的发展方式。”
“Look at Sparks, Nevada, where you have the Tesla factory where they make their batteries, then almost within throwing distance you have a Google data center campus, an Apple data center campus and a Switch data center campus,” Omdia’s Howard said. “That would be the kind of development where this technology would be really appropriate.”
虽然一些行业领导者提出了数据中心运营商在他们的园区内运行反应堆甚至使用微型反应堆而不是备用发电机的想法，但专家表示，现实几乎肯定会看起来更像 NuScale 在犹他州的项目，公用事业与数据中心提供商合作或其他最终用户资助模块化工厂。
While some industry leaders have raised the idea of data center operators running reactors on their campuses or even using micro-reactors instead of backup generators, experts say the reality will almost certainly look more like NuScale’s project in Utah, with utilities partnering with data center providers or other end users to finance modular plants.
这是数据中心行业过去成功采用的模式来推动可再生能源项目的发展，像Meta 这样的超大规模企业同意提前从计划中的风电场或太阳能电池阵列购买大部分能源以确保融资。
This is a model the data center industry has employed successfully in the past to drive the development of renewable energy projects, with hyperscalers like Meta agreeing to buy most of the energy from a planned wind farm or solar array in advance to secure financing.
“数据中心公司不会在这里成为电力公司，”Compass Quantum 的托尼格雷森说，他是一名退休的海军潜艇指挥官，他也一直在倡导数据中心行业使用SMR。“这样做的方式是数据中心公司签署长期购电协议，这些协议几乎是永久性的，所以他们可以向贷款人证明这一点，贷款人会给他们提供资金帮助他们建造工厂。”
“You’re not going to have data center companies becoming power companies here,” said Compass Quantum’s Tony Grayson, a retired Navy submarine commander who has become one of the data center industry’s more vocal advocates for modular nuclear power. “The way it’s going to happen is data center companies signing long-term power purchase agreements, which are almost money in perpetuity, so they can show that to a lender who will give them the money to help them build a plant.”
那么数据中心多久可以推动 SMR 的安装呢？
So how soon could data centers drive the installation of SMRs?
NuScale 用于爱达荷国家实验室的反应堆计划于 2029 年上线，但专家告诉 Bisnow，他们预计第一个商业数据中心应用程序还需要十年时间。尽管如此，对于一个大型设施需要两年多时间才能建成的行业来说，10 年完全在规划范围内。
NuScale’s reactor for the Idaho National Laboratory is scheduled to go online in 2029, but experts told Bisnow they expect the first commercial data center applications are a decade away. Still, 10 years is well within the planning horizon for hyperscalers in an industry where large facilities take over two years to build.
但即使是该技术最大的推动者也承认，广泛采用的重大障碍仍将存在，尤其是与核能相关的风险——无论是真实的还是感知的风险。
But even the technology’s biggest boosters acknowledge that significant barriers to widespread adoption will persist, not the least of which is the risks — real or perceived — associated with nuclear energy.
虽然核能作为数据中心行业中的“清洁”能源越来越被接受，但在环境、社会和治理指标以及碳减排目标方面，其地位仍然处于灰色地带，而这些正成为数据中心租户的主要考虑因素。在地方政府看来，高耗能数据中心的建设已经在弗吉尼亚北部和其他主要市场面临越来越多的政治反对浪潮，如果再建设核反应堆，当地政府将会面临更大的压力。
While nuclear power is gaining growing acceptance as a “clean” energy source within the data center industry, its status remains something of a gray area when it comes to environmental, social and governance metrics and carbon reduction goals that are becoming a major consideration for data center tenants. On a more local level, new data center builds are already facing a growing wave of political opposition in Northern Virginia and other major markets, and that is without a nuclear reactor coming with them.
SMR 的支持者坚持认为，对辐射或福岛或切尔诺贝利规模的潜在灾难的恐惧是没有根据的。他们指出海军 70 年来在没有发生一起重大事故的情况下在船上运行小型核反应堆的记录，以及海军现在在86 艘船只上安装了核反应堆，这些船只每天都毫无争议地进出主要城市。此外，他们表示，SMR 比传统核电站更复杂、更安全、更易于操作，而且它们的体积小意味着根本不可能发生大规模灾难。
Proponents of SMRs are insistent that fears about radiation or a potential catastrophe on the scale of Fukushima or Chernobyl are unfounded.They point to the Navy’s 70-year track record of operating small nuclear reactors on ships without a single major incident and to the Navy now having nuclear reactors on 86 vessels that sail in and out of major cities every day without controversy. Additionally, they say SMRs are far more sophisticated, safer and easier to operate than traditional nuclear plants, and their small size means that a large-scale catastrophe simply isn't possible.
尽管如此，像格雷森这样的核能倡导者表示，希望用 SMR 为数据中心提供动力的开发商和公用事业公司需要做好公共宣传活动和协调一致的公关工作的准备，如果他们希望推动项目向前发展的话。推动此类核项目向前发展的成功模式确实存在：格雷森指出，比尔盖茨资助的泰拉能源成功地为怀俄明州的反应堆项目建立了社区支持。
Still, nuclear advocates like Grayson say developers and utilities hoping to power data centers with SMRs need to be ready with public outreach campaigns and concerted PR efforts if they expect to move projects forward. Successful models for moving this kind of nuclear project forward do exist: Grayson points to Bill Gates-funded TerraPower’s success in building community support for its reactor project in Wyoming.
格雷森补充说，一些最大的数据中心市场已经在使用核能，因此在那里增加新反应堆不太可能引起争议。这些市场包括弗吉尼亚北部和菲尼克斯，他认为这些市场可能是 SMR 的早期采用者。“对我来说，这是显而易见的，”格雷森说。“两者都有已经运营核能的电力运营商，而且两者至少都在一定程度上受到电力限制。”
Grayson added that some of the largest data center markets already use nuclear energy, so the addition of new reactors is unlikely to be controversial there. These markets include Northern Virginia and Phoenix, which he sees as likely early adopters for SMRs. “To me, it’s a no-brainer,” Grayson said. “Both have power operators that already operate nuclear, and both are at least somewhat power-constrained.”
除了公众对核电的态度外，专家表示，与其他电源相比，建造、安装和维护 SMR 的成本最终将决定数据中心对模块化核电的需求。事实上，降低成本一直是NuScale、东芝和特里斯特尔能源等公司面临的主要挑战，这些公司使用模块化构造技术并使用现成的组件获得成本的竞争力。
Beyond public attitudes toward nuclear power, experts said it is the cost of building, installing and maintaining SMRs compared to other power sources that will ultimately determine data center demand for modular nuclear power. Indeed, reducing cost has been the primary challenge for companies like NuScale, Toshiba and Terrestrial Energy, who use modular construction techniques and use off-the-shelf components to keep the price of the technology competitive.
NuScale 表示，建造、运营和维护反应堆的总成本将与其他电源的当前费率一致，预计每生产 MW 的总成本为 40 至 60 美元。对于天然气和陆上风能，这个数字约为每兆瓦 37 美元。
NuScale says the overall cost to build, operate and maintain reactors will be in line with the current rates for other power sources, predicting an overall cost of $40 to $60 per MW produced. That figure is around $37 per MW for natural gas and onshore wind.
但是，即使 SMR 的经济性对数据中心有意义，专家表示，由于商业反应堆建造商和数据中心行业之间目前缺乏协调，采用的速度可能会被推迟，这可能是建造商之一最佳用例。Omdia 的霍华德表示，通常规避风险的数据中心行业有责任开始对话，将这项技术投入正常使用。
But even if the economics of SMRs make sense for data centers, experts said the pace of adoption will likely be delayed by what is presently a lack of coordination between commercial reactor builders and the data center industry, which could potentially be one of the builders' best use cases. Omdia’s Howard said it has put the onus on the typically risk-averse data center industry to start the conversations that can pull this technology into regular use.
霍华德说：“研究人员和像 NuScale 这样的私营公司以及政府方面的事情，他们已经合作了一段时间。”他们一直没有与潜在的消费者互动，并真正了解这将如何在商业上发挥作用。双方实际上正在讨论的事情现在才刚刚开始。”
“There’s the researchers and the private companies like NuScale and the government side of things, and they’ve all been working together for some time," Howard said. “What they haven’t been doing is engaging with their potential consumers and really getting a read on how this is going to play out commercially. Those two sides actually talking together is something that’s just developing now."
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