Currents Ep321: Financing the Next Wave of Nuclear

Podcast: Currents by Norton Rose Fulbright
Host: Todd Alexander
Guest: Jake Jurewitz, CEO of Blue Energy
Date: October 23, 2025

Episode Overview

This episode explores how modular nuclear power—specifically small modular reactors (SMRs)—could unlock a new wave of nuclear energy deployment in the U.S. Host Todd Alexander interviews Jake Jurewitz, CEO of Blue Energy, about why nuclear hasn’t lived up to its initial promise, what’s changing now, and how innovative approaches to project design, manufacturing, and financing could solve longstanding industry hurdles. The discussion draws parallels to methods used in offshore wind and LNG and analyzes the critical intersection of technology, finance, regulation, and public acceptance.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Why Has Nuclear Power Struggled?

• Main Barrier: Cost and Timeline
  • High capital expenditures, protracted build times, and frequent cost overruns deterred private finance. Most projects only proceeded with government support.
  • Complications magnified by the need for a highly specialized workforce, unfamiliarity with nuclear QA in U.S. construction firms, regulatory bottlenecks, and the compounding effect of long projects on capitalized interest.

  “You really only see these projects get built when there’s government guarantees, government financing involved…these projects have been two to three times over budget and behind schedule.”
  — Jake Jurewitz, [01:18]

• Compared to traditional civil mega-projects, nuclear’s unique risks and regulatory complexity create a large “surface area of exposure to critical path creep.”

2. The Blue Energy Approach: Modular, Prefabricated, and Parallelized

• Borrowing from Offshore Wind, LNG, and Oil & Gas

  • Leverage the shipyard/fab yard model where large, critical plant sections are prefabricated to fixed-price contracts, then transported by barge to sites.
  • Reduces field construction complexity, builds multiple modules in parallel, and minimizes on-site labor and delays.

  “What you can do is you can get fixed price contracts from fab yards and shipyards on large sections of prefabricated parts of the plant. Because they do that all the time in the oil and gas space... We think we can apply that same playbook to the small modular reactor space.”
  — Jake Jurewitz, [03:14]

• Not Just for Coastlines

  • These plants can be located near rivers, lakes, and canals anywhere modules can be barged in, not just on seashores.
  • Leverages fab yards for their existing skilled labor, automated QA, and infrastructure.

3. Reducing Construction Time & Interest During Construction (IDC)

• Parallel Construction

  • Prefabrication shortens build time by enabling parallel work and rapid on-site assembly.

• Early Balance-of-Plant Energization

  • Construct the conventional parts (turbines, cooling, etc.) and temporarily energize them with gas, securing earlier commercial operation and accelerating cash flow.

  “By designing it to be entirely built using this prefabricated supply chain, you do drastically shorten the build time... But the second thing we’re doing, we’re actually building that balance of plant first and then energizing it early with gas so that we can get assurance of a commercial operation date...”
  — Jake Jurewitz, [05:54]

• De-risking for Lenders and Offtakers

  • Decouples nuclear licensing risk from commissioning; lenders and power buyers get certainty on timelines.

4. Licensing and Development Progress

• Following a “Proven Path”
  • Blue Energy targets light water small modular reactor technology with an established fuel supply, capacity factor, and regulatory process.
  • Pursuing established NRC Part 50 licensing—construction permit followed by operating license.
• Site Control and Standardization
  • Secured a site and is conducting geotech analysis. Designing plant architecture to be site-agnostic for easier replication.

  “We have a site that we’ve taken control of earlier this year that we’ve started geotech analysis on and we’ve got a number of other sites in the pipeline...”
  — Jake Jurewitz, [09:37]

5. Plant Sizing and Scaling Strategy

• Target Size: 20–300 MW per SMR unit.
• Phased Deployment: Start small ($1–3 billion CapEx per first tranche), prove viability, then expand with multiple units per site to drive economies of scale and learning curve cost reductions.

6. Economics: Can Modular Nuclear Compete?

• Cost Benchmarks

  • Recent U.S./European builds: $15,000/kW (Vogtle, Hinkley Point C).
  • China/South Korea: $2,000–$4,000/kW.
  • Blue Energy targets: $8,000–$10,000/kW first unit; marginal units at ~$5,000/kW, with the ambition to go lower ($3,000/kW).

  “I think we’ll surprise everybody on how much lower cost nuclear power could get...” — Jake Jurewitz, [12:50]

• Financial Viability

  • Early units require higher power prices ($150/MWh range), but on par with offshore wind PPAs. Costs drop as more units are added and upfront non-recurring expenses are spread.
  • Higher capacity factor and stable fuel costs help nuclear compete with gas and renewables, especially as cost of capital declines.

7. Financing Structure & Investor Appetite

• No Single-Point EPC Risk

  • Mirrors LNG models: No lump-sum EPC; mitigates risk with larger contingency buffers and risk equity for first projects.
  • Investors embrace higher first-tranche prices to unlock long-term, lower-cost nuclear.

• Building Towards Project Finance Without Ratebase/Government Guarantees

  • Mix of venture capital, pension fund investment, and ongoing engagement with traditional infrastructure financiers.
  • Aspires to a future where commercial debt is accessible as with wind, solar, and gas.

  “We want to design something that does not depend on government guarantees, that does not depend on a rate base that can ultimately be attractive to commercial finance.”
  — Jake Jurewitz, [20:51]

8. Addressing “NIMBYism” and Siting Challenges

• Minimizing On-Site Impact

  • Modular design reduces workforce needed on site and project duration—less disruption to local communities.
  • “Nuclear island” built below grade, out of sight.
  • Able to select sites with supportive communities, often near existing nuclear facilities, avoiding the geographic constraints of wind/solar.

• States Receptive to Nuclear

  • Texas, Virginia, Georgia highlighted for strong state interest and policy support.

9. The Policy and Mindset Shift Needed

• Time to Strike

  • Unique confluence of rapidly-growing power demand (e.g., AI/data centers), state/utility/industrial interest, and skilled labor shortages requires a smarter, more modular construction approach.
  • The nuclear sector still has “10x” improvement potential unlike more optimized generation tech.

  “Right now is probably the best time in the last 70 years for nuclear power to be developed… Nuclear is still a place where there’s a lot of 10x opportunities for improvement both in terms of capital cost on a dollar per kilowatt basis…”
  — Jake Jurewitz, [22:26]

• Don’t Repeat the Past

  • Lessons from LNG and offshore wind construction should guide new nuclear, not traditional stick-built megaprojects.
  • Encourages a “shots on goal” mindset—multiple experiments in design and delivery.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “There isn’t something exotic, there isn’t an exotic material that a nuclear plant is made up of. It’s steel and concrete. Most of the cost is in the methodology of construction.”
  — Jake Jurewitz, [12:11]

• “We aren’t just trying to psych ourselves up to do another large civil engineering project that requires mobilizing 10,000 skilled workers at a time where skilled labor is at an all time low in terms of supply and availability.”
  — Jake Jurewitz, [22:46]

• “Our first site that we’re looking at is a co-location opportunity and we’ll be making very minimal use of the grid with our data center partner.”
  — Jake Jurewitz, [20:32]

• “You end up with a really low productivity factor on labor in the field if they’re not familiar with the site, they don’t know where their tools are, they don’t have automated processes set up like you do get in a fab yard or a shipyard.”
  — Jake Jurewitz, [12:00]

Timestamps for Key Segments

• [01:18] – Why nuclear power lags behind: cost, delays, and financing
• [03:14] – Modular, offshore-inspired construction and financing parallels
• [05:54] – Accelerating build, using gas for early revenue pre-nuclear COD
• [09:37] – Site control, licensing progress, and standardized plant architecture
• [11:42] – Cost per kilowatt: where nuclear stands and Blue Energy’s targets
• [14:04] – PPA pricing and cost trajectory with scaled deployment
• [16:57] – Managing risk, contingency, and financing structure
• [18:47] – NIMBYism and minimizing community impact
• [20:51] – Capital structure, investors, and moving away from government dependency
• [22:26] – Why now is the time for nuclear and lessons for industry/policy

Conclusion

This episode provides a detailed look at how new approaches in project design, supply chain, and financial structuring can address the nuclear sector’s historic cost and delivery problems. By borrowing proven strategies from the offshore wind and LNG world, minimizing on-site labor, decentralizing risk, and deploying capital more efficiently, Blue Energy aims to help modular nuclear become cost-competitive and commercially financed—attracting a new wave of clean, firm power for U.S. industry and the grid.

For more from the Currents podcast, visit www.projectfinance.law.