Accelerating Sustainable Development in Africa: Scaling Up Peaceful Nuclear Uses

From 30 April to 3 May 2024, the VCDNP, Wilton Park, Dalberg, and the Sustained Dialogue on Peaceful Uses, in association with the African Commission for Nuclear Energy (AFCONE), organised a multi-stakeholder workshop in South Africa to discuss opportunities and challenges, and the enabling conditions required, for the deployment of advanced reactors, including small modular and micro reactors (A/SMRs) in Africa.

Policymakers and regulators from 11 African countries, the United States (US), the United Kingdom (UK) and Canada, A/SMR developers from the US, UK, France, Denmark and China, the Novo Nordisk Foundation, the Oppenheimer Project, the Clean Air Task Force, potential investors, and international experts, including from the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s Nuclear Energy Agency, participated.

Participants agreed that energy poverty in developing countries requires urgent action to provide clean, affordable, and sustainable energy for all. Nuclear power, particularly A/SMRs, offers significant potential for enhancing energy security and achieving climate goals and brings nuclear power within the reach of developing countries. In addition to grid electricity, A/SMRSs could also provide off-grid power for energy-intensive industrial processes, such as for the production of hydrogen, ammonia and fertilisers, cement or steel, or for seawater desalination projects.

Considering the requirements for the successful and sustainable deployment of A/SMRs, participants emphasised the importance of investing in non-power applications. For instance, improving healthcare and food security could strengthen peaceful uses infrastructure in a country, thereby paving the way for the deployment of A/SMRs when they become commercially available. However, noting that many developing countries lack the required infrastructure and skills to develop a robust nuclear power programme and that A/SMR developers have insufficient knowledge and experience of developing country markets and conditions, the workshop sought to explore ways and means to close this gap.

Workshop participants agreed that urgent action was required to mainstream peaceful uses of nuclear technology in development and climate action frameworks and to develop new partnerships within these communities. The workshop participants made the following recommendations:

Regulatory and legal perspectives

1. Communication about the benefits of peaceful uses and the requisite legislative and regulatory requirements should be enhanced for different government offices and national parliaments.
2. Ratifying the international conventions and developing comprehensive nuclear laws and regulations early. This is an important first step in raising the country's capacity to regulate nuclear activities and should be done in such a way to allow for future expansion into nuclear power.
3. The technology vendor and the nuclear regulator of the exporting country should engage early with the government, the regulator and the radioactive waste management organisation in the importing African country. This will help to sensitise each other to their respective regulatory requirements and to develop harmonised licensing standards to the extent possible.
4. Safeguards-by-design should be promoted as a tool to ease the burden on the importing state and as a cost saving measure to reactor vendors, regulators and potential end-users.
5. Growing regulatory bodies commensurately with the size of the nuclear programme is important.

Financing Perspectives

1. As one of the primary challenges to further expanding nuclear is financing, governments should support international as well as non-governmental organisations in publishing short briefs targeted to policymakers to raise awareness about the benefits of peaceful uses and potential financing options with an emphasis on reaching international financial institutions, philanthropic organisations, and ODA funders.
2. To mitigate risks and risk perceptions related to financing, risk analysis models should be developed to identify what international financial institutions view as threats to their investment, who the owner of a given risk would be, what the associated costs are and how the risk can be mitigated through insurance, legal measures, government action or action by other stakeholders.
3. While there has been no financing by international financial institutions for nuclear new build projects in the past, there are lessons to be learned from other large financing projects by these institutions. These lessons should be studied by the non-governmental expert community, expanded upon and shared broadly.
4. Because of the current lack of financing by international financial institutions for nuclear new build projects, national governments should fund more research into identifying specific data points based on different financing models to ameliorate the perception that nuclear technology is too expensive.
5. Efforts to engage philanthropic foundations and ODA funders on peaceful uses of nuclear technology should be urgently scaled up, with NGOs and think-tanks playing a crucial role in convening these stakeholders alongside industry and governments. Supporting these organizations can facilitate dialogue, identify new partnership opportunities, and advocate for integrating peaceful nuclear uses into development and climate change mitigation frameworks, thereby advancing the safe, secure, and sustainable deployment of A/SMRs in developing nations.

Stakeholder involvement and perception perspectives

1. National governments could create parliamentary committees to examine the potential role of nuclear technology for development in their countries, identify national challenges and begin early consultations with national stakeholders to mitigate these challenges.
2. When communicating on peaceful uses with policy makers, the public and other stakeholder groups, simple language without jargon should be used, backed up with easily accessible data and statistics. 
3. A platform with easily accessible information with relevant data and statistics for journalists, policy makers and industry should be created on the benefits of peaceful uses, how nuclear science and technology contributes to development and climate change mitigation, and on nuclear safety, security and safeguards. This platform should complement and provide links to the IAEA’s website.
4. When engaging with the public in Africa on nuclear power development, it is essential to start with the traditional leaders (chiefs) at local levels, as their buy-in will be necessary to mount local support for nuclear power.
5. The United Nations could establish a World Nuclear Day to provide international spotlight on the nuclear-climate-development nexus.

Infrastructure perspectives

1. Political will is essential for the sustainable deployment of SMRs. African policymakers should promote the inclusion of nuclear technology in Africa’s Agenda 2063, promote nuclear power for development to international financial institutions, such as the World Bank, and insist on increasing the share of nuclear power in the energy mix.
2. Human resource development should begin as early as possible, including education on nuclear technology starting from the elementary level through tertiary and vocational training. This will not only assist with human resource development as such, but also with public acceptance.
3. Universities should share experiences with one another to attract more students, establish more nuclear engineering programmes and devise harmonised curricula.
4. There should be more engagement between grid operators, reactor designers and international experts on the grid-related necessities of nuclear power.
5. More work in scientific forums should be dedicated to issues of siting nuclear facilities, including the conditions required for up-and-coming nuclear power plant designs and engagement with the general public in potential sites. Along the same vein, once a site is identified, priority should be placed on socio-economic development in that area to attract job seekers.
6. Utilize IAEA resources like the Nuclear Harmonization and Standardization Initiative (NHSI), the SMR Platform, the Milestones Approach,  technical guidance documents, and request IAEA review missions and advisory services. These provide valuable frameworks and support

The VCNDP wishes to thank the Sustained Dialogue for Peaceful Uses and the US Department of Energy for its support.

VCDNP Senior Fellow Ingrid Kirsten and Blue Capsule president Edouard Hourcade hosted a podcast with Loyiso Tyabashe, CEO of the South African Nuclear Energy Corporation (NECSA), and Rebecca Tadesse, Head of the Radioactive Waste Management and Decommissioning Division at the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency.