The Atomic Exchange Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

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The Atomic Exchange Podcast

Goran Calic and Michael Tadrous

Technology

Frequency: 1 episode/7d. Total Eps: 32

The Atomic Exchange Podcast is your gateway to the world of nuclear energy and beyond. Join Dr. Goran Calic, a business school professor at McMaster University, and Michael Tadrous, his research assistant and co-host, as they spark engaging, dynamic conversations on the latest developments in nuclear science, energy policy, and global innovation. With compelling discussions and authentic perspectives, Atomic Exchange is the fusion of news, ideas, and dialogue you’ve been waiting for.

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AI Demos, Workforce Math, and Answering Nuclear’s Critics

Monday, August 18, 2025 • Duration 54:47

In the 30th installment of The Atomic Exchange Podcast, co-hosts Dr. Goran Calic and Michael Tadrous open with lab updates: early demos of their custom AI for the Canadian nuclear sector with McMaster Nuclear Operations & Facilities and Ontario Power Generation (OPG), plus a check-in on a new workforce input–output model and paper on what it would take to triple Canada’s nuclear capacity by 2050. They also pause to explain what the lab actually studies at the intersection of nuclear, economics, and policy. Then they run another Good Science vs Bad Science segment, taking apart an anti-nuclear op-ed. Point by point they test claims about build times, costs, and LCOE sources, add firming and financing where it belongs, and compare real-world grids like France and Germany. They look at mining risks across uranium, solar, wind, and hydro, clarify what “meltdown” rates really mean, and show how waste is stored and tracked. The takeaway is simple: fix execution and timelines, keep existing plants running where safe, and judge technologies on apples-to-apples numbers that reflect how power systems actually work. Tune in for another thoughtful discussion on all things nuclear.

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Golf Cutbacks, Tabletop Therapy, and Dominion’s Offshore Wind Math

Friday, August 8, 2025 • Duration 54:04

In the 29th installment of The Atomic Exchange Podcast, co-hosts Dr. Goran Calic and Michael Tadrous start with Goran's recent “less golf, more miniatures” lifestyle change, trading four-hour rounds for meditative tabletop painting and a quick riff on career phases and moderation. Then they dig into Dominion’s Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project: 2.6 GW across 176 turbines with a $10.7B headline that feels like “almost three gigawatts” until you factor capacity (about 42% on average, weaker in summer), a 30-year life, and the firming needed when wind drops. Goran walks through the real planner math, including financing and why firming can add roughly $40 per MWh now and rise as renewables grow. They compare CVOW to Vogtle 3 & 4, noting the $32B “nuclear cost” hides interest on an overnight cost near $12.5B, and that faster builds and realistic risk pricing can bring firm nuclear to about $150 per MWh, under wind once firming and financing are counted. They also hit incentives and politics, regulated-utility pass-throughs, AI data centers that can’t curtail, and the unglamorous risks of offshore hardware, from corrosion to cut cables, in a country with just one new jack-up vessel. A candid, numbers-first episode on speed to grid versus longevity, and why Dominion’s short-run choice may still leave a long-run gap that nuclear can fill.

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Supply-Chain Bottlenecks, Codification Creep, and Mission-Driven Incentives

Friday, August 1, 2025 • Duration 51:42

In the 28th installment of The Atomic Exchange Podcast, co-hosts Dr. Goran Calic and Michael Tadrous welcome their first ever guest, Scott MacKinnon, Senior Director of Logistics & Supply-Chain Network Integration at EtherLog°. Scott recounts how Goran’s McMaster talk on “why standardization can slow nuclear builds” sparked a pub-side debate that now becomes a full episode on logistics. The trio unpack codification creep, ask why 75 % of craft labour often waits idle, and probe whether just-in-time delivery really fits multi-gigawatt projects or if local buffers and “zero-trust” micro-measurement are safer bets. They model a hypothetical four-unit program, debate which chokepoint (reactor pressure vessels, grid gear or regulatory sign-offs) most threatens a schedule, and swap ideas for Apollo-style medals, pain-and-gain contracts, and 100 % completion bonuses to turn nuclear megaprojects into a true mission. Tune in for supply-chain stories, systems thinking, and a fresh lens on how logistics could shave years (and billions) off the next reactor build.

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Airport Ammo, Meta’s Energy Dilemma, and Launching The Business of Nuclear

Friday, July 25, 2025 • Duration 50:09

In the 27th installment of The Atomic Exchange Podcast, co‑hosts Dr. Goran Calic and Michael Tadrous open with two case‑method deep dives. Goran debuts his new Harvard Business School case, Meta’s Energy Dilemma, where MBA teams weigh Llama’s vertical integration and whether Meta should own its own generation, trading land use, CO₂ and even “annual deaths” in a live financial model. That segues into his earlier Twitter takeover case, showing why students, armed with hard numbers, often side with Elon Musk’s mass‑layoff playbook while pundits and HR orthodoxy balk. Michael then checks in from Denver with a surreal Pearson Airport vignette: a calm traveler, a pistol magazine, and fifteen identical note‑taking officers. From there the pair launch a new recurring segment, The Business of Nuclear. Michael runs the tariff math: even a 50% U.S. Section 232 steel duty and Canada’s tightened quota move nuclear power costs by only pennies per MWh. Goran broadens it into a consumption‑vs‑income‑tax debate before previewing future company spotlights. Tune in for case‑room contrarianism and an inaugural market lens on nuclear’s growth.

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Streamer and Poker Grinds, Canadian Steel Tariffs, and Nuclear Realpolitik

Friday, July 18, 2025 • Duration 37:05

In the 26th installment of The Atomic Exchange Podcast, co‑hosts Dr. Goran Calic and Michael Tadrous open with a lighter detour on “always‑on” careers. Goran recalls his short‑lived stab at professional online poker, where the glamour fades into a smoky 12‑hour grind, while Michael explains why he would be the world’s worst poker player ever. The conversation then pivots to Hamilton, where Prime Minister Mark Carney has promised a 50 % tariff on non‑CUSMA steel that exceeds 2024 volumes and a fresh billion‑dollar innovation fund for domestic mills. Goran walks through the hard numbers: Canada exports roughly half its steel, 90 % of it to the United States, and argues Carney’s move is less chest‑thumping than a bid to stay in Washington’s good graces while shielding local jobs. Michael pushes back, asking whether the policy is more optics than leverage and whether deeper US integration at this point would really help Canadian industry. So, make sure to tune in for some poker metaphors, streamer angst, and a candid episode of trade‑policy math.

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Cancun Workcations, Our 25th Episode Milestone, and a Self‑Interview

Wednesday, July 16, 2025 • Duration 01:11:15

In the 25th‑episode milestone of The Atomic Exchange Podcast, co‑hosts Dr. Goran Calic and Michael Tadrous set aside reactor talk to focus on something different: each other. Michael kicks things off fresh from a week in Cancun, weighing beachside bliss against the itch to keep emailing drafts, while Goran unpacks why an off‑season, high‑fixed‑cost resort can feel five‑star on a three‑star budget. From there the episode gets a bit personal, with Goran and Michael trading two‑truths‑and‑a‑lie, sharing music tastes, pet peeves, and the meanings behind their names. They recount how a stab‑wound hospital visit and a university Christian club shaped their parents’ love stories, revisit the best and worst advice they’ve ever heard, and reminisce on some of their best decisions and their biggest regrets. Tune in for a candid, funny, slightly nostalgic detour before the next reactor deep dive.

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Self-Driving Road Trips, European Travel Tangents, and a “Bad Science” Takedown

Friday, July 4, 2025 • Duration 01:01:53

In the 24th installment of The Atomic Exchange Podcast, co-hosts Dr. Goran Calic and Michael Tadrous open with a summer catch-up: Goran’s solo Tesla trek from Dundas to Ottawa, complete with full-self-driving lane changes and meditative highway moments, and Michael’s impending family hop to Cancún. A light detour into European favourites follows, where Vienna’s café culture, London’s imperial streetscapes, and France’s sun-drenched south square off against under-whelming Greek ruins and the question of whether ancient monuments should be fully rebuilt or left as evocative rubble. The episode then pivots to another segment of Good Science vs. Bad Science target, a Frontiers in Environmental Economics paper that labels nuclear “an impediment to climate mitigation.” Point by point, the hosts dismantle claims that reactors are uninsurable, uneconomic and fundamentally incompatible with renewables, citing real-world capacity factors, lifetime-extension data and grid-price comparisons between France and Germany. Along the way they spotlight how cherry-picked construction timelines, hand-waved system-costs and “so-called” digs at small modular reactors slip past peer review, and why bad scholarship can still sway policymakers and AI training data alike. A brisk reminder that evidence, not ideology, should guide the energy transition and that sometimes the worst papers make the best teaching moments.

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Comment Backlash, Ontario’s Heat-Wave Strain, and the AI Gigawatt Challenge

Monday, June 30, 2025 • Duration 39:48

In the 23rd installment of The Atomic Exchange Podcast, co-hosts Dr. Goran Calic and Michael Tadrous begin by wading into the unexpected torrent of criticism on their recent Conversation article, examining everything from disclosure-doubts to misread safety statistics, and reflecting on when and how to engage with online pushback. They then turn to Ontario’s summer heat wave, where demand has surged to within two gigawatts of the province’s all-time peak, wind is running below 20 percent of capacity and solar covers barely one percent, forcing gas plants into four-times-their-forecast output. What would it really take to replace those peakers with storage or faster nuclear builds? Finally, they probe a SemiAnalysis warning that AI training data centres are drawing full-reactor-scale power and flipping from full load to near zero in milliseconds, threatening grid synchronization unless hardware and software fixes arrive. Tune in for a candid conversation on criticism, capacity and the next frontier of power-grid risk.

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Radon Reality Checks, Deep-Geological Doubts, and the Case for Keeping Waste On-Site

Monday, June 30, 2025 • Duration 40:29

In the 22nd installment of The Atomic Exchange Podcast, co-hosts Dr. Goran Calic and Michael Tadrous open with a surprising PSA: radon gas is the deadliest radiation risk most people face, linked to roughly 21 000 lung-cancer deaths a year in North America, yet few homeowners even test for it. From cheap basement monitors to Canada’s uranium-rich soils, they lay out what listeners can do today. The conversation then shifts underground (literally) to deep-geological repositories. Finland’s Onkalo vault may soon become the world’s first “forever” dump, but Goran argues its tidy economics hinge on having just two nearby plants, nothing like the sprawl of ninety U.S. reactors. Michael counters that America’s stalled Yucca Mountain project shows one national site is politically impossible, while hauling fuel across state lines or Indigenous lands would likely push costs from today’s US $0.1–2 per MWh (on-site dry casks) to four-plus cents. Together they ask: if decades of safe, cheap on-site storage already exist, are DGRs solving a real safety gap or simply buying expensive peace of mind? Tune in for a brisk, number-driven debate that challenges nuclear orthodoxy and reminds us sometimes the safest place for waste is right where it sits.

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System Costs, SMR Showdowns, and a Dispatch from D.C.

Friday, June 13, 2025 • Duration 53:07

In the 21st installment of The Atomic Exchange Podcast, co-hosts Dr. Goran Calic and Michael Tadrous debrief day one of MIT & CATF’s “Nuclear Energy: Key Facts & Figures” summit. They break down why levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) misses the true system price tag, compare the wildly different financing models behind Olkiluoto-3, Hinkley Point C, Barakah, and Turkey’s Akkuyu plant, and marvel at uranium’s 50-million-to-1 energy-density edge over coal. The conversation then turns to small-modular reactors: how venture capital might finally enter the game, whether water-cooled LEU designs will crowd out exotic sodium- or lead-cooled concepts, and why a handful of winners could dominate an “SMR buffet” of 900 possible variants. Along the way they swap first impressions of D.C. and wrestle with industry pessimism on whether this moment really is the last nuclear renaissance. Tune in for a conference-floor download packed with numbers, nuance, and a dash of travelogue.

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The Atomic Exchange Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

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The Atomic Exchange Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

Podcast details

Recent rankings

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Shared links between episodes and podcasts

RSS feed quality and score

Publication history

Latest published episodes

Similar podcasts and content

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Related Shows Based on Content Similarities

Apple Podcasts

Spotify