With its withdrawal from Afghanistan and the decision to end programs that have shaped America’s conflicts for the past two decades, the Biden administration’s Pentagon is planning long-term competitions against China and Russia. But for the Pentagon’s mobile microreactor project, Project Pele, it’s still 2007.
Designed to provide power to remote troops, Pele is designed to fight the last war that did not involve high-end threats and where vulnerable fuel convoys were a major source of American casualties.
The Pentagon is calling on Congress to spend $ 60 million on Pele next year. Congress should step on the brakes. Not only is Pele rooted in anachronistic military scenarios, but it would also be a prime target for precise missiles and drones against Chinese, Russian, North Korean or Iranian military personnel, as well as a source of tension with nuclear-skeptical US allies who are expected to run the reactors.
The problem isn’t feasibility. Small reactors like Pele should be able to power forward-operating bases and – along with electric or hybrid vehicles – could almost eliminate the need for fuel convoys on the front lines.
The problem is that power generation equipment and other supporting infrastructure are high on the Chinese and Russian target lists. China’s newest ballistic missiles can deliver warheads ranging from explosive submunitions to high-speed tungsten rods, while recent attacks in Saudi Arabia, Syria and Nagorno-Karabakh have shown the lethality of Russian, Chinese, Turkish and Iranian missiles and drones. These weapons could cause catastrophic damage to a reactor facility.
To counter the threat of an attack, Pele’s fuel is said to be inherently stable and resistant to core meltdowns.
Maybe, but a major attack could bury the fuel in ruins, preventing it from dissipating heat and exceeding its design temperature. And even if the fuel is left intact, it is radioactive and would pose a contamination risk if it were released from the reactor by attack.
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Rest assured that our allies are unwilling to house Pele reactors that enemies are sure to attack. Unlike Iraq and Afghanistan, where the governments were committed to the United States and there were no guided weapon threats, US forces confronting China would have to operate on Japanese, Australian, or Filipino soil – nations that have strong anti-aircraft threats. Have an atomic mood. The US governments in Guam or the Northern Mariana Islands have fewer options, but residents there are unlikely to welcome new radioactive targets for Chinese missiles.
US forces could reduce the threat to mobile reactors by removing them from the front lines. However, this diminishes their value in solving logistical problems. More importantly, Pele is being moved away from the front lines to bring it closer to civilians who are concerned about Pele’s everyday radiological footprint. Instead of trains of diesel mechanics and fuel convoys, the army needs squads of nuclear power plant operators and pallets of test material and water treatment equipment. The return trip will also be full. Any glove, paper towel, and sample bottle would likely be considered low level waste and, possibly in the United States, require special disposal.
Conclusion: Pele creates more military challenges than it solves.
Mobile reactors could be useful to supply remote settlements and polar or lunar stations with electricity, which is why NASA and the Department of Energy are supporting the project. But Pele is the wrong answer to the power-hungry military sensors, electric combat vehicles, and directional energy weapons of tomorrow. To deliver these systems, the Pentagon should take a broader approach. Rather than promoting a convenient solution from the past, the Department of Defense should drive energy innovations through competition, such as the pricing challenges that the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has successfully used to drive new robot and semiconductor designs.
New energy technologies are available. Solar and wind generation are now being advanced and used by the commercial industry. Developments in batteries, capacitors and flywheels are already revolutionizing energy storage. A combination of these and other as-yet-unidentified technologies could meet the US military’s energy needs and could be more easily deployed than Pele. Congress should reallocate Pele’s proposed budget to fund competitions to uncover and capitalize on these new approaches, rather than picking a winner today who is likely to lose tomorrow.
Bryan Clark, a retired U.S. Navy submarine officer, is currently a Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute and Director of the Center for Defense Concepts and Technology. Henry Sokolski is the Executive Director of the Non-Proliferation Policy Education Center. He served in the Department of Defense’s Office of Net Assessment and as its non-proliferation deputy under then Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney.
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