Every gardener should read The Lives of Bees: The Untold Story of the Honey Bee in the Wild by Thomas D. Seeley. Gardeners are aware of the mix of pollinators required to service our plants and make food growing possible. We tend to forget this key insect, Apis mellifera, has been present on Earth for from six to eight million years. Before there was agriculture, there were common honey bees. Understanding wild bees and how they interact in the wild is useful and relevant knowledge.
The book is comprehensive, and based on the author’s research as well as that of others. There is a lot about bees I hadn’t considered before.
Wild honey bees position their hives a good distance from each other, a half mile apart on average. This serves multiple aspects of bee life—defensive purposes and limiting the spread of parasites such as the Varroa destructor and contagious viruses between colonies.
Likewise, bees have evolved to prefer a hive entry in a hollowed out tree around 15 feet above the ground. The small entry usually leads to the lower third of the cavity. If we want to find a wild honey bee nest in a tree, we must look up. This positioning is likely an evolutionary aspect of hive location. Curiously, black bears—a main bee hive predator—have eyesight that can’t see bees flying in and out of an opening that far up a tree, according to Seeley.
As humans domesticated bees in apiaries, they did what makes sense for beeswax and honey production—built larger hives for their swarms of bees. According to Seeley, wild honey bees strongly prefer tree cavities with a volume of about 10 to 12 gallons. In addition to size, the tree cavity provides insulation from cold weather. Contrast that with commercial apiaries whose average size is 20 gallons, nearly twice the ideal size. Seeley found less tendency for apiary bees to swarm in larger hives. The result has been allowing mites like the Varroa destructor to propagate better. In a section called Darwinian Beekeeping, he detailed his process. Commercial bee keeping removed a natural defense built up among bee colonies over thousands of years of evolution.
The physical book was made using a heavier paper than most mass market books. In fact, it was a bit much to read in bed because my hands got tired of holding its weight. The photography and illustrations make the premium paper worth the workout of holding and reading it. There is more than just the physical object. If you have ever wondered about bees, this is a comprehensive and readable reference. Highly recommend.
Signs of spring are everywhere: First sets of goslings on the lake with their parents, songbirds throughout the forested area, and earlier morning sunrises. During my at-home retreat, I have been keeping irregular hours and changing most everything about my daily schedule. On Tuesday I slept until first light, immediately dressed, and headed out for my morning walk without any of the normal daily regimen. It felt weird, but I did it. Behind all the schedules and regimen, I’m still me.
I came across what appeared to be a molted feather of a Barred Owl on the trail. Because I hear owls high in the tree canopy in the predawn light, there is ample additional evidence they are around. The feather confirms the species of owl. While researching the feather, I discovered the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918, which governs such findings. The common outdoor saying, “take only pictures, leave only footprints,” applies here.
Barred Owl feather on the state park trail. The rules, according to the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918, are to not touch them, tempting as it may be to pick it up and take it home. I took this photo and left it where I found it.
If you’ve been in the spice aisle of a grocery store, the high prices are quite noticeable. A jar of organic dried basil costs $7.75 per ounce at a local chain grocery store. If one buys bulk via mail order, the cost of a pound of the same product is $0.86 per ounce. I bought bulk of basil, marjoram, and parsley and shared the savings by giving some of it away to family.
Dried herbs bought in bulk and then broken down for a gift.
The big spring project is planting the garden. For now, I can stand all the work and hope to continue at least another ten years. Indeed the fresh produce—where I control the inputs—is of high value in our household. The year-to-date expense is running 73.4 percent of 2025. Lower costs have to do with purchases made last year, and reusing fencing, plastic ground cover, and the covered row. I’m not finished spending money but the trend is hopeful. Every pound of home-grown produce displaces money I would have to spend at the grocer or farmers’ market. It is a good way to live.
There was a chance of rain, but not much of a chance. We need rain, but the deep soil moisture is probably sufficient. The recent sunny and windy days have been drying the garden’s surface soil. That’s another spring worry—getting sufficient rain to produce a garden crop. Officials at the National Weather Service say we are near normal. That is good enough for today.
After spading the next garden plot on Sunday, I went to the home, farm, and auto supply store to get fence posts. It was a madhouse around 12:30 p.m. with families out and stocking up on all kinds of home items. The person ahead of me at the cashier tallied up more than $500 worth of merchandise. Outside in the parking lot, the garden center was set up and like me, people were buying things to use in the garden. I was home alone, so didn’t mind being with people, even if I didn’t know anyone by name.
On the way down, I drove past Walmart and Lowe’s, which both likely carry the fence posts I needed. I would rather shop where I knew one of the principals while I worked there. I held a “retirement job” to earn enough money to fill budget gaps until reaching full retirement age. The job ended during the coronavirus pandemic when I decided the risk was not worth the reward. One of the owners stopped to see me every time he was in town, and sent birthday and holiday cards with a personal note. Big box stores don’t offer that sort of amenity.
It was Mothers’ Day. As I looked for the fence posts I saw several mother-daughter couples filling carts. The reason I felt they were mother-daughters is because of their similar faces combined with an appropriate age difference. Thoughts turned to my own mother.
My last memory of her was walking her casket from the hearse to the grave site next to Father. The ground was uneven and my grip was unsure. I almost tripped and the casket lowered unevenly with the other pall bearers, shifting Mother inside. She was never big on celebrating Mothers’ Day, although I miss being able to pick up the phone and call her.
They didn’t have the size fence posts I needed at the home, farm, and auto supply store. I bought five three-foot ones for tomato cages, but will have to get the four- and five-foot ones elsewhere.
As I headed home across the lakes I felt the garden workday was at an end. Tomorrow looked like another beautiful spring day for progress. Earlier in the day, I wished my spouse a Happy Mothers’ Day and she replied our child sent her a nice note. This trip was about more than garden supplies.
The terms “data center,” “energy,” and “artificial intelligence” get bandied about in the media. It would be good to have a better understanding of what these things mean in the context of the rapid growth of artificial intelligence. Hannah Ritchie sorts through some of this in an article titled, “How much electricity does AI consume?” Read it here.
From what I understand, “data center” does not mean a single thing. For example, when Google signed a long-term contract with NextEra Energy to buy most of the electricity generated from a refurbished nuclear power plant in Palo, Iowa it had specific intentions for use. In multiple public statements it indicated the electricity was to support cloud and artificial intelligence infrastructure. Where exactly the electricity would be used has not been specified, nor is the contract tied to any specific future facility. Likewise, before Duane Arnold Energy Center comes on line in 2029, plans for usage could change.
If one uses artificial intelligence at home, it seems obvious AI is an industry in transition. I have been using various AI tools for about a year, and from a user perspective, the interface and results change often, in some cases daily. By 2029, there could be dramatic changes in both cloud and artificial intelligence process and usage. To use the Google example, what Google thinks it will use this contracted electricity today, may not be what they use it for in 2029 and beyond.
It is often missed that electricity and energy do not mean the same thing. The former is a subset of the latter. For example, when I worked as a consultant in Kentucky, the steel mill which was our customer had predicated its business on the availability of low electricity prices at night to melt scrap metal for their rolling mill. I have experience with a number of corporations that used energy to heat and dry products, forge steel and aluminum, and other industrial uses. That doesn’t mention home heating, automotive, and aviation uses of energy. When we discuss data centers, in terms of energy use, we are speaking of electricity.
A friend’s son works for a major multinational corporation and is working on development of artificial intelligence to support their manufacturing and sales operations. It is a major project involving travel to many countries where the company has a footprint. I expect most large companies are doing similarly. The results of these exploratory efforts will change how they do business, including the fear that AI will replace human workers in large numbers. There are fears and there are actualities and unfortunately we don’t know the latter today.
My point is when talking about data centers, energy and artificial intelligence we must do better than to bandy about terms for which there are better definitions. We should not avoid that discussion but participate actively in it when possible. Doing so meaningfully means knowing about what we bring up. In the case of AI we are discussing electricity.
By my calculations, we passed the last frost and the rest of the garden can go in. If cold temperatures return, I have a banker’s box full of old flat sheets to cover and protect young plants.
Three plots had been planted, leaving four and part of the garlic patch with which to do something. I know one will be exclusively tomatoes, two will be a mix of vegetables, a small plot will be fennel, celery and celeriac, and the last will be some kind of winter squash. A lot of work is finished, and a lot remains before initial planting can be called done.
I planted spinach in the covered row simply to get the tray out of the overcrowded greenhouse. I learned how to use covered rows from my friend Susan while working on her farm. The best parts of a covered row are protection from pests and a controlled environment that enhances normal growth. I bought the hoops from the farm where I worked and the cover from a commercial supplier a number of years ago. If cared for, the cover will last.
Friday, I bought thyme, sage, and chive plants from local farmers I know. These will go under the cover with parsley, cilantro and basil. Once the plants get too tall, I will strip the cover back and let them grow in open air. This process can produce a large herb crop for drying. If there is enough, I will make fresh pesto and freeze some.
At the farm, each herb pot was four dollars. To put that in perspective, I have more than 700 blocks with plants started, or according to this retail value, about $2,800 worth of them. I don’t mind paying full price at the farm because I can leverage their work to get a few things I want but don’t have space in the greenhouse to grow.
I spent a couple of hours weeding garlic. I had hoped to have it mulched with grass clippings by now but there weren’t enough, therefore weeding. Collecting grass clippings was high on my weekend to-do list, yet there really isn’t enough grass to mow yet.
There were some empty spots in the cruciferous vegetable plot so I filled them in from the greenhouse. At this point, I want every spot filled with something. The crop looks healthy thus far.
Saturday was a solid shift in which I planted lettuce and tatsoi in the covered row, cleared off the celery and celeriac plot, and cleared last year’s tomato plot. I salvaged most of the plastic ground cover to reuse and made burn pile #3 for the season.
Burn pile #3.
Sunday morning was spent spading the big plot I cleared. It was a lot of work, yet part of the process of conditioning the soil.
Fourth plot turned over on May 10, 2026.
I wasn’t planning on running so many errands this week. The main one was Monday’s round trip to Des Moines. I had poll worker training at the county seat on Thursday, and a Friday get-together with a friend who just moved back to Iowa. Running errands takes away from gardening, yet is essential to a modern life. Much as I wish for something different from automobile culture, it is what we have in our decision to life in rural Iowa.
It was a good week of preparations. I am looking forward to getting the whole garden in during the next few weeks as we are on the cusp of summer.
In between stints of spading, I took a break in the garage. The addition of the table to the left is making a big difference.
Once or twice a year, my spouse visits her sister in Des Moines. That means, at least in part, I have the house to myself for a week or so, and can cook how I want—more meals that include capsaicin in its varied forms. During these times, I seek to better bind my activities with intent, simplify them, and break existing habits by changing the daily, physical markers that prompt them. If possible, I would re-invent my regimen. That may be a lot for a week.
A primary consideration is that while home alone, everything has new rules. Rules regarding noise, kitchen activities, and access to the washer and dryer. We get along on these topics most of the time, yet I cut loose during the absences: I got caught up on laundry by day two! I made a spicy version of rice and greens! This time there is more intent on my part during our period of separation.
The house is quiet when I wake, so I can walk to the kitchen for a drink of water in my underwear. I’ve been able to move my morning reading to the living room when during normal conditions, she is using it. I frequently wonder what she is doing, then recall she is not here. It is another aspect of breaking set habits. It is surprising how much depends upon her physical presence.
On what was a “normal day,” everything was structured around productivity blocks and task completion. During this retreat, I don’t want a lighter version of that. A different process is at work with fewer work switches, fewer obligations, and more sustained, intentional engagement with one thing at a time. Less planning and more doing. I break loose from the compartments of reading, chores, errands, food prep and writing that occupied my active mind.
Food is a large part of a retreat. Two days after she was gone, I decided to have a two-day fast during which I limited caloric intake, and structured meals so there are more fruits and vegetables in the morning along with two main meals at lunch and dinner. The idea was to stick with the caloric limits, the hope being to help my body with digestion and maintenance.
During a retreat things naturally settle into a pattern. I resist that. I wake early, read in the living room, exercise, then spend long uninterrupted stretches in the garden. By afternoon my clothes are stained with with soil and sweat. The rhythm of digging, planting, and weeding replaces the compartmentalized routines that usually govern the day. Tasks that once felt separate — cooking, watering, reading, laundry, writing — begin to fold into one another.
Habits become visible when I am alone. When the dishes are done before bedtime, I see the empty sinks in the morning and feel ready to fill them again. Unawares, I notice how often I expect to hear another person moving through the house, or delay entering a room because I assume it is occupied. It reveals how much of ordinary life is built from quiet interactions and repeated physical cues rather than conscious decisions.
By the end of the week, I doubt I will have reinvented myself. I will be thankful for the brief chance to examine my life while habits loosened. Retreat enables me to eat differently, work differently, move differently through the house, and remember that habits are not permanent fixtures so much as paths worn into the carpet by repetition. Some days I want to vacuum it all up and start over.
Footbridge over a field runoff creek into Lake Macbride.
I spent time Sunday working on how to use my time. The two parts were structuring days into time blocks and working to better define tasks listed for accomplishment. This post details some of what I did.
The natural breaks in my days at home are by time.
From waking at or before 4 a.m., I have a combination of routine morning things (calisthenics, breakfast, exercise, reading, writing), and unstructured creative time.
There are three pomodoros of 50 minutes each, beginning at 8 a.m. Each ends with a ten-minute break. I schedule activities for these pomodoros the day prior.
A break at 11 a.m. to have lunch, run errands, and perform household chores. Check social media, email, blog performance. This breaks up the day.
At 1 p.m., two pomodoros of 50 minutes each with a ten minute break in between.
Once the pomodoros are finished, I head to the kitchen to do dishes and begin preparing dinner.
5 p.m. is a social hour with my spouse plus dinner, usually together.
Evening check in on social media, email, household tasks, and chores. Followed by sleep.
These time periods follow a natural rhythm developed since the coronavirus pandemic. While I need to watch the clock sometimes, there is a flow from one activity to the next that sometimes runs over. Almost always, I follow the seam toward completion if I can.
I need to learn to be more outcome oriented than task oriented. For example, clear one garden plot of debris from last season and till represents an outcome. It provides more structure than simply writing on the planner to spend time in the garden. Deliverables matter.
A main question is how will I structure more complex projects that span multiple days, weeks, and months? The good thing about the pomodoros structure is they force breaking complex tasks into do-able work units. This will be another learning process.
I was already using this structure unawares. We all need to maintain productivity and keep our daily routines fresh. When it seems like work, the system requires corrective action.
Supporting the environment has changed since the first Earth Day. Then the president was aware of public support for protecting the environment and took concrete action. Now, the president couldn’t give two hoots in a holler about it, as evidenced by his support for copper mining in the Boundary Waters. Times have changed, even as the climate crisis knocks on our door daily with some new deviation from what used to be normal conditions.
I wrote about my personal progress in an unpublished memoir:
From Earth Day to Climate Reality
My advocacy for environmental causes came in two time periods: one that began in high school with the first Earth Day, and the second after joining the Johnson County Board of Health. Two and a half years after leaving the board of health, I joined the Climate Reality Project.
The first Earth Day on April 22, 1970, was part of a cultural phenomenon which got the president’s attention. I participated in the event while in high school. When the Council on Environmental Quality and the Environmental Protection Agency were created soon after, I felt a palpable relief. Government was taking responsibility. These actions assuaged my high school concerns about the environment. With the government now involved, I could turn my attention to other things.
While on the board of health, Maureen McCue and I were active advocating for regulation of toxins in the environment, especially for better air quality. This was a combination of my family’s history of working in coal mines, my grandfather’s suffering and death from black lung disease, and new concerns about air quality raised while I was on the board of health. The main work was to advocate against the use of coal for electricity in Iowa. Planned coal-fired power plants were held back in Waterloo and Marshalltown by a coalition of environmental groups of which we were a part.
The film An Inconvenient Truth was released in 2006 and won the Academy Award for best feature-length documentary of the year. It featured former Vice President Al Gore presenting the science and risks of climate change to a mass audience. Inspired by the force and clarity of that narrative, I traveled to Chicago in July 2013 and participated in the Climate Reality Leadership Program which trained us to present climate science and promote solutions in our communities.
Gore gave his Inconvenient Truth presentation twice, once as he had in the film, and then once on the second day with explanations about each point. During the training we learned about the latest science of climate change, best practices in public speaking, and connecting with an audience, communication strategies, social media, leadership skills, and community outreach and organizing.
The goal was to teach attendees to give the presentation ourselves and advocate for the environment in our home communities. In return for the training, I agreed to make 10 presentations using course materials. I would go on to attend training three more times, serving as a mentor to others. Importantly, I gave presentations where I could attract an audience: at an event at the Solon Public Library, and on farms, and throughout the region. Being a Climate Reality Leader helped me feel like I was part of something bigger than myself. I particularly enjoyed sitting with Al Gore and a small group of leaders at the Cedar Rapids training, talking about issues of the day.
Increased awareness of climate science helped me reinterpret a lifetime of weather. As a child, my father took me to the bank of the Mississippi River to see the record flood of 1965. The flood water seemed endless then and was unforgettable. At the time, it stood out as a singular event.
Singular events accumulated.
In April 1973, more than twenty inches of snow fell across Iowa in what should have been spring. In 1993, as we were building our home in Big Grove Township, a flood described as a 500-year event delayed construction by a month. In 2008, another “500-year” flood backed water into the watershed of a nearby 900-acre lake, stopping barely a hundred yards from our front door. The change in intensity of events was noticeable, particularly the flooding which had been commonplace when I was in grade school.
Precipitation was extreme, yet there were also heat waves. Farmers still talk about the 2012 drought. It was so hot and dry for such a long period that corn leaves curled upward to preserve moisture, and yields dropped sharply. Drought returned from 2020 through 2024, described by the state climatologist as the longest since the 1950s.
In 2019, I measured thirty-five degrees below zero at home as the foundation creaked and a lower-level window broke. On August 10, 2020, I watched a derecho tear through the neighborhood, damaging all but one tree on our lot and uprooting three entirely. Cleanup became routine. Repairs were expected.
Straight line winds, derechos, droughts, tornadoes, Iowa has always had severe weather. What changed was the frequency and the scale. Individually, each event could be dismissed as weather. Together, they formed a pattern. Climate Reality offered a way to address causes rather than consequences—to work upstream instead of continually rebuilding downstream. That was hopeful.
Politicians and industry were slow to respond to our advocacy. All the same, we kept at it. I had an opportunity to talk about coal-fired power plants with Bill Fehrman, then president and CEO of MidAmerican Energy, at an event at Old Brick in Iowa City. To say it politely, he knew how to handle me, pointing to their expansion into wind generated electricity and said they would eventually eliminate coal from their electricity generation mix. I made several trips to lobby in Des Moines with both Republicans and Democrats. With Democrats, I was preaching to the choir. Republicans appeared to listen.
I wrote letters to the editor and guest opinions, I was interviewed by radio and television reporters, I participated in large conferences and my own scheduled events. One time I gave an abbreviated version of the Inconvenient Truth lecture to three farmers while helping them plant crops at a nearby vegetable farm. I did what I could to raise awareness of the ongoing climate crisis.
It has been a rainy week. Too much moisture in the garden to plant, and constant showers to keep me inside. When the weather is like this, I make a point to find space between rain clouds and get in my 30-minute daily morning walk. A two-hour rain delay is typical.
When I finally got on the trail, I took this photo. There are two geese. The one on the left is ducking its head in the water while the other keeps watch. I don’t usually see them this close to shore.
While waiting for the rain to end, I emailed U.S. Senators Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst to vote no on HJR 140 which pertains to opening the Boundary Waters to foreign copper mining. It took a couple of minutes. Here is what I said:
I urge you to vote NO on House Joint Resolution 140, the Congressional Review Act targeting the Boundary Waters mineral withdrawal. The Twin Metals mine is owned by a foreign company that has an agreement with China to smelt the copper in China for free — and China gets the copper. The United States gets nothing but the pollution. No United States Senator should support this anti-American bill that would allow China to pollute our most treasured wilderness to gain a competitive edge over us. Please stop it by voting NO.
Bread on the water. The resolution needs only a simple majority, which if they get it, Poof! The Boundary Waters are open to mine runoff. That is, after the inevitable lawsuits end.
On Thursday, the Senate approved the resolution in a 50-49 vote, so folks are lawyering up.
One day this week a beaver was swimming a few yards off shore. They are common in the area and occasionally cut down trees along the lake shore. I have also seen mink on the trail. It reminds me of a time when natives trapped fur-bearing creatures to trade with white people. Typically that was in autumn.
I once visited the House on the Mound in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, built by Hercules Dousman. He managed trading operations for John Jacob Astor’s American Fur Company in the Upper Mississippi Valley. The Victorian-style home was luxurious by any standard. It was called the house on the mound because it was built upon an ancient native burial mound. Dousman flourished on the Wisconsin frontier. “As a fur trader, railroad builder, grain-shipper, he became the most influential figure of the upper Mississippi Valley and the Midwest’s first millionaire,” wrote August Derleth in his 1958 book The House on the Mound.
The beaver I saw seemed unaware of the value of its fur.
If we look closely, there is evidence of lives lived long ago all around us. I used to go with a friend to Palisades Kepler Park near Mount Vernon to climb the bluffs overlooking the Cedar River. I don’t do rock-climbing any more, but I used to enjoy it. On top of those bluffs were Native American burial mounds.
According to Google search results, “The Native American mounds located along the bluffs, represent the prehistoric Woodland Indian culture. These sacred sites include conical and effigy mounds that are often knee-high, with some reaching up to six feet, serving as a reminder of early indigenous habitation.” The burial mounds are some of the last remaining in the area. So many of them were turned into farm land, or like the House on the Mound, built upon by white settlers.
Whether it is waiting out a rain delay or observing our habitat, it is easy to feel connected to nature, and to civilizations that went before us. We forget that Iowa wasn’t always a grid of farms, towns and cities. There were woodlands and prairies, and pure springs flowing within walking distance of where we built our home. On days like this I can imagine the grid being lifted, then walking this land like Natives did in the 17th and 18th Centuries. I live for that imagining. It can be who we are.
A joke is circulating on the internet that SMR stands for Spending Money Recklessly. It isn’t funny because it is true, even if big money investors have a plan to recoup their investment in Small Modular Reactors with interest. Regular folks like me don’t want new nuclear power when renewable projects that include solar and wind power generation can meet much of our needs.
Here’s the rub with my way of thinking: renewables are clean, cheap, and safe for the first 70-80 percent of meeting our electricity needs. Something needs to fill the gap so the grid can reliably deliver exactly the amount of electricity customers use. What fills that gap? Nuclear energy is a candidate for that, yet it is beset with problems, especially in the United States, like some I mentioned last week.
In her new book, Clearing the Air: A Hopeful Guide to Solving Climate Change in 50 Questions and Answers, author Hannah Ritchie has four on nuclear power:
Q: Isn’t nuclear power dangerous? A: Nuclear power is not risk-free, but it’s one of the safest energy sources we have.
Q: Doesn’t it take too long to build a nuclear plant? A: Nuclear plant in the West often have long delays., but some countries can build plants in six to eight years.
Q: Isn’t nuclear power too expensive? A: Nuclear power is expensive, especially in the U.S. and Europe, but some countries are building it much cheaper.
Q: What about radioactive waste? A: We know how to handle radioactive waste safely in deep geological sites, but countries need to prove it.
Ritchie points out there is almost no case for fossil fuels to fill the mentioned 20-30 percent gap in our electricity needs going forward because they are unsafe compared to other forms of electricity generation. When we recognize all their external costs, they are too expensive.
SMR stands for Small Modular Reactor. These nuclear reactors are designed to be factory-built and transported to the installation site as modules, allowing for streamlined construction, scalability, and potential integration into multi-unit configurations, according to Wikipedia.
According to Ritchie, one of the problems of U.S. construction of nuclear power plants is there are not enough experienced workers. We need to build a good number (maybe 10-12) of identical nuclear power plants to train workers in these jobs. Changing government regulations regarding nuclear power have created an environment where each plant is different and that variation is part of the reason construction is delayed. Controlling the design characteristics of Small Modular Reactors by building them in a factory could possibly address the worker issue by standardizing non-site specific differences between nuclear power plants.
As I write this, Eastern Iowa does not have a confirmed commercial SMR project, nor does anyone in the country. There is talk about installing one or more at the Duane Arnold Energy Center in Palo. By “talk” I mean there is policy activity in the Linn County Board of Supervisors, and discussion of existing infrastructure to handle nuclear materials at Palo. Last month, in both the Iowa Senate and House, legislation (HSB 767/SSB 3181) moved to provide sales and use tax exemptions for nuclear energy projects. If enacted into law, it would encourage development of nuclear power projects in Iowa. So far, Iowa is at jump street regarding new nuclear power.
The idea of implementing new SMRs in an environment where there are zero of them in commercial operation in the U.S., seems a bit unlikely. It would be if I were the investor. The role of the federal government is critical in advancing this form of electricity generation.
There is also the legacy to deal with. While nuclear power is safer, by orders of magnitude, than fossil fuel electricity generation, when a problem happens as it did in Fukushima, Chernobyl, or Three Mile Island, it receives global attention. There are other, real-world issues.
Any discussion of nuclear power in the U.S. carries the weight of our earlier nuclear history. Civilian nuclear reactors are distinct from weapons programs, but they share regulations, institutions, supply chains, and a legacy of radiation policy shaped during the Cold War. Uranium mining for both weapons and fuel exposed workers and nearby communities. Atmospheric testing at the Nevada Test Site spread fallout across the country, including in Iowa, and as far away as Rochester, New York, where radioactivity ruined film being produced by Kodak. These experiences led to compensation programs and continue to influence public trust, particularly when new projects or waste sites are proposed. The relevance is not technological equivalence between power generation and weaponry, but the role that historical exposure plays in how communities assess risk today.
One might ask, isn’t the president eliminating regulations to enable the nuclear power industry? Yes and no. While the administration shifted policy direction toward evaluating nuclear reactor proposals more quickly, reducing the regulatory burden, and treating nuclear power as a strategic national priority, it does not mean there are no regulations at all. In fact, the changing regulatory environment is one reason why it takes much longer to build a new nuclear power plant here than in other countries. Every regulation change demands design changes for accommodation. One expects post-Trump administrations to make more regulatory changes.
Small Modular Reactors are no silver bullet, although no form of electricity generation is without issues. Whether SMRs move from planning to commercial use is an open question in 2026.
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