Decouple

Janus: The Army’s Second Attempt at Fielding Microreactors

18 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode of Decouple, Dr. Jeff Waksman, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Army for Installations, Energy and Environment, explains ho...

Why the First Nuclear Renaissance Failed: Can America Build Eight AP1000s Now?

11 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The first U.S. nuclear renaissance collapsed under the weight of cheap shale gas, lost institutional expertise, and disastrous projects like Vogtle an...

The Real Stakes of a Saudi Nuclear Deal

02 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Saudi Arabia burns nearly one million barrels of oil per day to keep its lights on, yet it has cheaper and faster ways to replace this than by buildin...

Microreactors: A Mirage of American Nuclear Innovation?

25 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode, Chris Keefer speaks with Hadron Energy founder Samuel Gibson, the twenty four year old entrepreneur pursuing a ten megawatt integral ...

The AP1000 Masterclass

18 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Fan favourite, James Krellenstein, returns for a deep dive into the AP1000. We walk through how its conservative nuclear steam supply system is built ...

The Great Nuclear Reshoring

11 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In late October, amid the choreography of President Trump’s visit to Tokyo, two vast and curiously intertwined announcements were made: an $80 billi...

Russia’s Maritime Nuclear Fleet: A Glimpse Behind the Curtain

04 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week on Decouple, I sit down with Aleksey Rezvoi, a veteran maritime nuclear engineer who began his career in the Soviet Union designing third- a...

How China Builds Reactors So Fast

28 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week I sit back down with François Morin in his third appearance on the show. François is the World Nuclear Association’s point person on Chi...

Engineering State v. Lawyerly Society

21 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week on Decouple, I sit down with Dan Wang, a research fellow at Stanford’s Hoover History Lab and author of "Breakneck: China’s Quest t...

Where Is Nature Going?

14 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we zoom out to the broader intellectual themes that shaped Decouple’s origins five years ago. I’m joined by Jesse Ausubel, a visionary ...

Handling the Heat

06 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Process heat accounts for two-thirds of industrial emissions. Yet talk of decarbonization often misses the engineering realities that separate viable ...

Nuclear Meme Stocks

30 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Nuclear has entered its meme stock moment. Last week, Oklo hit a market capitalization of $20.7 billion—more than established nuclear giants BWXT, C...

Carbon Dioxide: Earth's Thermostat

22 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, award-winning science writer Peter Brannen returns to Decouple to explore the 4.5 billion-year story of carbon dioxide on Earth. Grounding ...

To Bomb or Not to Bomb

15 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Professor Alex Wellerstein returns from the set of WIRED (watch his excellent appearance here) to help me understand the origins of Middle Eastern nuc...

Rare Earth Emergency

08 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we talk about rare earth metals. What are they, where do they come from, and how are they redefining global power? I’m joined by David Ab...

Battery Power

01 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we talk about the rise of the global battery industry: its history, key players, raw material struggles, and how China came to dominate it....

The Export Expert

18 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we talk about Russian nuclear exports. Michael Seely, host of AtomicBlender, joins me to discuss the rise of Rosatom: Russia’s nuclear en...

#289 - Breaking the Ice

12 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we travel to the edge of the map with Aleksandr Surtcev, an engineer who has crewed Russian nuclear icebreakers along the Northern Sea Rout...

The State of the Atom (2025)

28 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, Mark Nelson joins us to deliver his second annual “State of the Atom” address. The nuclear power landscape has transformed in the last ...

Sun, Silicon, and Xinjiang

08 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we talk solar power—a long overdue topic on Decouple. In the past, guests have often been critical of the value of renewables on grids wi...

Small Reactor, Big Price

02 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

We have an unusual episode today. One, because of its length (1 hour 40 minutes), and two, because I’m the guest. Joined by Aidan Morrison as acting...

Is Wright's Law Wrong?

25 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we return to nuclear power. Specifically, nuclear construction and “learning curves.” It is intuitive that doing something over and ove...

Is America Making Itself Irrelevant?

17 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, I’m joined by Kyle Chan, author of the recent NYTimes Op-Ed titled "In the Future, China Will Be Dominant. The U.S. Will Be Irrelevant." ...

Tim Cook, Nation-Builder

03 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, I’m joined by Patrick McGee, a journalist and author of Apple in China: The Capture of the World’s Greatest Company. I recommended this...

Trump's Nuclear Executive Orders

28 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Last week, U.S. President Trump signed four executive orders to accelerate nuclear power deployment:Deploying Advanced Nuclear Reactor Technologies fo...

No Risk, All Reward

20 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we look beyond the physical infrastructure supporting our lives to the owners taking over that infrastructure: asset managers. Brett Christ...

Hellbrise

13 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the wake of Europe's largest blackout in decades, commodities investor Alexander Stahel helps us to understand the physics of power grids, and ...

The Iberian Blackout

06 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we cover the recent blackout on the Iberian peninsula. Guillem Sanchis Ramirez, a Spanish nuclear engineer and advocate, walks us through t...

Cycles of Life

29 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we take a break from nuclear power to talk about larger systems: those of Planet Earth. Professor Andy Knoll, renowned Harvard geologist an...

Hard Lessons with Hot Helium

22 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we talk High Temperature Gas Reactors, or HTGRs, with a Decouple favorite: reactor designer and nuclear historian Nick Touran (What Is Nucl...

The Machines Behind The Machines

08 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we talk tools. With precision machinist Noah Rettberg, we explore a facet of modernity as important as energy, for it is the technology tha...

Respect the Rads

01 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we talk radiation—the elephant in the room during many conversations about nuclear power. Nick Touran, a reactor designer and nuclear his...

Pass the Salt

25 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Molten Salt Reactors are often portrayed as nuclear’s great missed opportunity, promising unparalleled safety, efficiency, and fuel sustainability. ...

"Better Water Reactors"

18 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we talk Boiling Water Reactors (BWRs) with James Krellenstein, the CEO of Alva Energy. We dive into the engineering, history, and physics o...

The Industrialization Playbook

11 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we talk industrial policy. Economist and author Steve Keen joins me to shine light on the present moment by exploring the historical use of...

Fuel for Thought

04 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Today, we talk uranium nuclear fuel. MIT Professor Koroush Shirvan, joins me to dive into the hidden complexities of nuclear fuels. From early fuel ex...

China, the Electrostate

20 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we return to China. David Fishman, senior manager at The Lantau Group, joins me again to dissect the unprecedented scale of China’s elect...

Mission: Recommission

11 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week,Decouple Germany correspondent Noah Rettberg, a physics laboratory technician and precision machinist, talks about the potential to restart ...

Carbon Capture for Dummies

04 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we talk carbon capture. Canadian engineer and entrepreneur Ian MacGregor joins me to explore this misunderstood technology through the lens...

Electric Dreams

28 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we go to China. I spoke with David Fishman, senior manager at The Lantau Group, on the motivations and strategy behind China’s world-lead...

Oil: A Masterclass

14 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Mark Nelson, managing director of Radiant Energy Group, joins us for a Masterclass on the slippery subject of oil. We zoom from ancient plankton to mo...

A Civil Nuclear Debate

24 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Two thought leaders in the nuclear energy conversation, James Krellenstein and Ted Nordhaus, join Decouple for a “debate” over the question of rea...

Reactors on Wheels

17 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Jeff Waksman, program manager for Project Pele, joins Dr. Chris Keefer to discuss the impetus for the military microreactor project, the logistics and...

A Heterodox Economics Lesson

10 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Steve Keen, economist and author, joins me to explain how modern economics has catastrophically misunderstood the role of energy in our world and unde...

The End of an IRA?

03 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Phil Chaffee, Editor of Nuclear Intelligence Weekly and Bureau Chief of Energy Intelligence’s New York offices, joins me to discuss the implications...

The Forgotten Climate Debate

26 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Jean-Baptiste Fressoz, a French historian of science & technology, shares how European societies grappled with climate change centuries before mod...

Defense in Depths

19 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Aidan Morrison, director of energy research at Australia’s Centre for Independent Studies, takes us to the depths of Australia’s security predicam...

Microreactors, Macro Problems

12 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Nick Touran, a nuclear engineer and manager at TerraPower, unearths the sobering realities of micro nuclear reactors. Through a detailed discussion of...

Paper Reactors to Power Reactors

05 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Nick Touran tells the story of Admiral Hyman Rickover, the “Father of the Nuclear Navy” and author of the legendary "Paper Reactor" memo. We disco...

TMI: Too Much Intervention?

29 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

James Krellenstein, co-founder of Alva Energy, explains precisely what happened at the Three Mile Island accident, in which an ordinary reactor trip c...

Small Reactors Are Bulking Up

22 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Koroush Shirvan, an MIT professor and consultant on recent major reports on nuclear economics, sheds light on the hidden costs of small modular reacto...

321, Liftoff!

15 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Jigar Shah, Director of the Loan Programs Office (LPO) at the U.S. Department of Energy, joins me to discuss his office’s latest Pathways to Commerc...

Lead the Way, TVA

09 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Fred Stafford, a STEM professional and anonymous energy commentator, discusses the Tennessee Valley Authority's potential to lead a nuclear revival in...

The Energy Transition Will Not Happen

02 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Jean-Baptiste Fressoz, a French historian of science and technology, challenges our understanding of energy history. He unravels the myth of energy tr...

The Bottomless Well

25 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Mark P. Mills returns to Decouple to challenge our understanding of energy scarcity and efficiency. In this episode, he unravels the paradox of how pu...

The Three Mile Island Melt Up

20 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Microsoft and nuclear plant owner Constellation have entered into to an unprecedented deal to restart the closed Three Mile Island by 2028 to power it...

A Westinghouse of Pain for Korea

10 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power, is embroiled in a bitter legal dispute with Westinghouse over IP rights and export control obligations. Will this confl...

The CANDU Story

05 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Tim Freeman, VP of Field Services and Manufacturing at CANDU Energy Inc joins me to discuss the 3rd most widely deployed reactor technology in the wor...

Will EVs Deliver on Decarbonisation?

17 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Ashley Nunes, a senior research associate at Harvard Law School, joins me to disentangle the hope from the hype in the EV debate.

The Real Costs of Advanced Nuclear

08 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Robbie Stewart and Enrique Velez-Lopez, the founders of nuclear start up Boston Atomics, join me to discuss the true costs of advanced nuclear design ...

The Geography of Oil

03 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Jimmy Fortuna of Enverus takes me on a world tour of oil production by region illuminating the unique geopolitical, technological and political challe...

Australia’s Nuclear Debate

27 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Aidan Morrison, Director of Energy Research at the Centre for Independent Studies joins me for an update on the Australian nuclear debate which is sha...

Is an AI Energy Crisis Looming?

17 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Mark Mills is the executive director of the National Centre for Energy Analytics and author of “The Cloud Revolution” How the Convergence of New T...

We’ve Got to Talk About the Bomb Some More

01 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Professor Alex Wellerstein returns for a part two answering questions about the bomb, near misses, command and control and more.

Is Regulation Strangling Nuclear Energy?

24 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Is overzealous regulation the root cause of the contemporary crisis in deployment of nuclear reactors in the USA? James Krellenstein argues that Nucle...

Climate Change and Mass Extinctions: A deep time perspective

08 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Science journalist Peter Brannen joins me to discuss the kill mechanisms of Earth’s five mass extinctions. Humanity has developed the god like power...

Modularity: Lessons from chemical process engineering

23 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

How should we think about modularity in the nuclear space? Jesse Hubesch joins me to disentangle the much hyped concept of modularity from his perspec...

We've Gotta Talk About the Bomb

14 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Historian of science Professor Alex Wellerstein joins me to talk about the sword haunting the ploughshare of the peaceful uses of nuclear energy.

Marcel Boiteux: Builder of the World's Greatest Nuclear Fleet

09 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Marcel Boiteux, a shy economist who escaped occupied France to fight the Nazis before working out the theory of electricity pricing for newly-national...

The Chinese Atom

08 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

While the west struggles to deliver nuclear plants and dreams about novel reactor technologies China is deploying it all: large LWR, SMR and MSR/HTGR....

Renewable Nuclear: All about Breeder Reactors

22 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In the early days of nuclear power uranium was thought to be a critically rare mineral. Nuclear engineers sought to solve this problem with a special ...

Vogtle part 4: Can Positive Learning Happen Next?

16 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The Grand Finale is here. We wrestle with the question of whether nuclear can find its groove and the positive learning rates that have eluded it so f...

A Chat with the Nuclear Barbarian

09 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Emmet Penney joins me to shoot the breeze and catch up on the whirlwind developments of the last few months.

Californication of the Grid

30 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Fan favourite, Mark Nelson, joins me for an update on California’s soaring electricity prices and worsening grid dysfunction.

Deep Sea Mining

26 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Seaver Wang, oceanographer and co-director of climate and energy at the Breakthrough Institute joins me to unravel controversies surrounding deep sea ...

Will Nuclear power AI?

18 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

James Krellenstein joins me to explore the extraordinary power requirements of the AI revolution and how this demand for vast amounts of baseload gene...

The Fragilization of the Grid

08 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

David March CEO of Exergy/Energy joins me to discuss the sharp decline in power quality from increasing penetration of intermittent generation and the...

Peak Cheap Oil?

06 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Art Berman joins me to discuss the likelihood and implications of cheap peak oil.

LNG the Champagne of Energy

27 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Stephen Stapczynski, Bloomberg Business senior reporter, joins me to discuss everything you always wanted to know about LNG but were afraid to ask.

Ontario’s Nuclear Revival: Minister Todd Smith

23 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Ontario Energy Minister Todd Smith joins me to discuss the phenomenon of Ontario’s centrality to the West’s nuclear energy aspirations.

Vogtle Part 3: Was the NRC to blame?

20 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

James Krellenstein returns to deeper dive the lessons of Vogtle and VC Summer

The Energy Returns of Unconventional Oil

16 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Chris Popoff returns to talk unconventional oil with a focus on oil sands. What is it? What are its energy economics? How is it like a battery? What d...

Vogtle Part 2: Murphy’s Law

12 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

James Krellenstein and I continue our deep dive analysis of what went wrong at Vogtle.

The Politics of a Canadian Nuclear Revival

09 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

As Canada embarks on a new nuclear build out of SMRs and large Reactors, Professor Duane Bratt joins me to provide a political scientists perspective ...

Prospects for Process Heat & “Advanced” Nuclear

07 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Noah Rettberg walks us through an in depth exploration on the challenges of decarbonizing process heat.

It's a Material World

31 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Ed Conway author of “Material World” joins me to explore the material world underpinning the ethereal world of our perceived reality. He explains ...

Vogtle Part 1: the Nuclear Renaissance That Wasn't

25 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

James Krellenstein returns to dig into what went wrong at Vogtle and why the nuclear “Renaissance” of the early 2000’s ended up a flop.

Extreme Weather and Alberta’s AWOL Renewable Energy

17 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Alberta, sitting on massive reserves of oil and gas, found itself teetering on the edge of blackout this week as temperatures in the negative 40 degre...

From Microchips to Atom Splits

08 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Nathan Myhrvold, former CTO at Microsoft and vice chairman of TerraPower joins me to discuss his experience bridging the world of software and nuclear...

A Fireside chat with Sec. Ernie Moniz

28 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Sec Ernie Moniz and I chat about best practices for “embarking” and “re-embarking” nations as 24 countries pledge to triple nuclear energy by ...

Cracking the Nuclear Innovation Nut

22 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Humanity went from inducing the first fissions of heavy elements in 1938 to a nuclear powered submarine in just 16 years. Why has that tremendous pace...

COP28 & The Inconvenient Truth about Coal

17 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Robert Bryce joins me for a COP28 “reactions” episode and drops some hard truths on the world’s ever increasing appetite for coal.

How to Fuel a Tripling of Nuclear Energy

12 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Dr. Keefer sat down with some of the Titans of the nuclear fuel cycle at the “Net Zero Nuclear Summit” on the sidelines of COP28 in the UAE where ...

NuScale, New Problems

02 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The cancellation of the Carbon Free Power Project was a massive blow to US SMR front runner NuScale. James Krellenstein joins me for a deep dive.

Ontario’s Green Energy Act

28 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Chris Adlam joins me to discuss Ontario’s attempt to imitate Germany’s Energiewende. It began as an attempt to kickstart a green energy industry b...

Enriching Uranium Understanding

13 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

One in 20 American homes are powered by Russian enriched uranium because the USA lacks sufficient enrichment capacity to meet its own needs. Energy an...

US Offshore Wind Dead in the Water?

06 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The recent cancellation of two large wind projects in New Jersey are the latest in a series of setbacks for the nascent US offshore wind industry. Mar...

Small Misunderstood Reactors

18 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

James Krellenstein joins me to discuss the rationale underlying small modular reactors and in particular the challenges of getting novel reactor conce...

Why is Western nuclear so expensive?

11 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Jacopo Buongiorno joins me to discuss the cost drivers of nuclear and how we can drive them down. For a deeper dive check out this MIT study that Jaco...

Are renewables jobs the “fast food” employment of the energy transition?

07 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Dr Keefer’s Testimony at the House of Commons Natural Resources Committee on what Canada can learn from the Inflation Reduction Act’s “good unio...