Institutionalizing a promise: The case of small modular reactor regulation in Finland

Abstract

This article focuses on one element of the institutionalization of the techno-scientific promise of small modular reactors (SMRs) in Finland, namely the regulatory reform designed to facilitate SMR deployment. The research material consists of various public documents and press articles from Helsingin Sanomat. An advocacy coalition of industry, researchers, experts, public authorities and politicians has been formed to argue for a regulatory reform as a vital precondition for the success of the SMR promise. The analysis shows the importance of embedding the SMR promise in, for example, the national climate and energy strategies. The institutionalization of the promise through national regulatory reform is in itself embedded in multi-level and complex transnational dynamics of regulatory harmonization and standardization, which involve a myriad interactions between political, economic and social actors.