Generation IV nuclear reactors: Current status and future prospects Giorgio Locatelli a,n , Mauro Mancini b,1 , Nicola Todeschini b,2 a University of Lincoln, Lincoln School of Engineering, Brayford Pool, Lincoln LN6 7TS, United Kingdom b Politecnico di Milano, Department of Management, Economics & Industrial Engineering, Via Lambruschini 4/B, Milano, Italy HIGHLIGHTS  Generation IV reactors are the middle–long term technology for nuclear energy.  This paper provides an overview and a taxonomy for the designs under consideration.  R&D efforts are in the material, heat exchangers, power conversion unit and fuel.  The life cycle costs are competitive with other innovative technologies.  The hydrogen economy will foster the development of Generation IV reactors. article info Article history: Received 15 May 2012 Accepted 23 June 2013 Keywords: Generation IV nuclear power plants Economics Base load power plants abstract Generation IV nuclear power plants (GEN IV NPPs) are supposed to become, in many countries, an important source of base load power in the middle–long term (2030–2050). Nowadays there are many designs of these NPPs but for political, strategic and economic reasons only few of them will be deployed. International literature proposes many papers and reports dealing with GEN IV NPPs, but there is an evident difference in the types and structures of the information and a general unbiased overview is missing. This paper fills the gap, presenting the state-of-the-art for GEN IV NPPs technologies (VHTR, SFR, SCWR, GFR, LFR and MSR) providing a comprehensive literature review of the different designs, discussing the major R&D challenges and comparing them with other advanced technologies available for the middle- and long-term energy market. The result of this research shows that the possible applications for GEN IV technologies are wider than current NPPs. The economics of some GEN IV NPPs is similar to actual NPPs but the “carbon cost” for fossil-fired power plants would increase the relative valuation. However, GEN IV NPPs still require substantial R&D effort, preventing short-term commercial adoption. & 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The evolution of nuclear power plants is conventionally seg- mented in to four generations (GIF, 2002):  I generation (1950–1970): early prototypes of several different designs;  II generation (1970–1995): commercial power plants, usually LWRs (light water reactors) reliable and economically com- petitive;  III/III+ generation (1995–2030): evolution of II generation LWR;  IV generation (2030+): designs called revolutionaries because of their discontinuity with III generation NPPs. The development of GEN IV technologies is coordinated by GIF (Generation IV International Forum), an international organization founded in 2001. This organization publishes the referential documents for GEN IV NPPs: GIF (2002, 2009a, 2009b, 2012). This paper, in the first section, presents the state-of-the-art of the literature to understand the strengths and weaknesses of each design implementation of each specific GEN IV technology. The second section analyses the data to: (1) develop a set of taxo- nomies to classify and compare the designs according to the most important technical and economical drivers; (2) present the most important R&D areas, the enabling factors and the barriers; (3) compare the economics of GEN IV projects with other base load technologies in the same time frame. 2. Literature review: GEN IV technologies This section reviews the six GEN IV technologies (VHTR, SFR, SCWR, GFR, LFR and MSR) and, for each of them, (in the Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/enpol Energy Policy 0301-4215/$ - see front matter & 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2013.06.101 n Corresponding author. Tel.: +44 15 2283 7946. E-mail addresses: glocatelli@lincoln.ac.uk (G. Locatelli), mauro.mancini@polimi. it (M. Mancini), nicola.todeschini@mail.polimi.it (N. Todeschini). 1 Tel.: +39 022 399 4057. 2 Tel.: +39 022 399 4096. Please cite this article as: Locatelli, G., et al., Generation IV nuclear reactors: Current status and future prospects. Energy Policy (2013), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2013.06.101i Energy Policy ∎ (∎∎∎∎) ∎∎∎–∎∎∎