Energy runs on a slow clock: a store from 2014, a rule from 2019, a test in 2027
Victoria Shinder2 min readFive energy stories published on 6 and 7 October, read side by side, are mostly about time.
A building finished twelve years before it was used. Urenco's uranium oxide store at Gronau was completed in 2014 under the plant's 2005 expansion licence. It was formally commissioned in October 2026. The material it is meant to hold has to travel to France or the UK for deconversion first, and the reason for keeping it — that depleted uranium may one day be reused — has no current reuse route.
A rule proposed seven years ago, rejected now. Energie Kontor raised CUSC modification CMP330 in December 2019, to let developers build grid connections longer than 2 km themselves. The industry panel recommended it unanimously in July 2023. Ofgem rejected it on 7 October 2026 — not on the merits, but because the companion modification it depended on was withdrawn in June, and because the real fix needs licence changes that a code modification cannot deliver. The next step is a consultation.
A reactor that went critical in July, at full power in 2027. Deployable Energy's Unity microreactor reached zero-power criticality by 4 July 2026. Its full-power test inside Idaho's DOME testbed is scheduled for 2027, after Radiant's year-long campaign — and the company must hit milestones to keep its slot. This is the fast track of US nuclear policy.
A merger with a 12-to-18-month clock now has a lieutenant governor against it on the day hearings begin, and a governor positioned to appeal the final order to the state Supreme Court.
The counter-example. Thailand's cabinet approved a rule making national safety standards mandatory for solar panels. It takes effect the day after publication in the Royal Gazette, and the standards institute says panels with IEC test results can be registered in no more than five days, with 279 import licences to be issued this month. The rule is fast because it was designed to reuse something that already exists — international test reports — instead of building a new process.
The reading. The slow items share one feature: each depends on something else finishing first — a deconversion route, a companion code change, a testbed queue, a regulator's final order. Thailand's rule depends on nothing new. For anyone planning around energy policy, the useful question about a new rule is not what it says, but how many other things must be completed before it does anything.