International collaboration is vital in developing and deploying new nuclear power technologies such as microreactors but programmes, probably in the form of public-private partnerships, will be needed to stimulate full-scale deployment, former US energy secretary Ernest Moniz told an International Atomic Energy Agency panel discussion.

Mr Moniz said microreactors – small plants ranging from 1 to 20 MW – can be factory-fabricated and put into place to run for a very long time, essentially without attention.

“The entire nuclear unit will be produced in a factory and shipped to its operating site,” Mr Moniz said. But he warned that the first microreactors could come at a high cost and initially without a large order book needed for manufacturing. “Government-private partnerships will be needed,” he said. “There will have to be a very rapid drop in unit cost as manufacturing proceeds, which I believe will happen.”