The reasons HMS Queen Elizabeth is not nuclear powered - Many people have wondered why the Queen Elizabeth Class aircraft carriers do not have nuclear propulsion like the US Navy’s Nimitz class ships. Here we consider the many good reasons why a conventional, although innovative propulsion system was selected instead. The primary advantage of a marine nuclear power plant is the unlimited range and available power it provides the ship. This range and power would be desirable for the Queen Elizabeth Class, but the costs and other factors largely outweigh these benefit. USN carriers are a few knots faster than the Queen Elizabeth Class, the speed of the ship can generate more wind over the deck to help heavily laden aircraft take off. This wind is less critical for Queen Elizabeth Class’s ski-ramp launched VSTOL aircraft.
When on operations, the ship’s air group will consume considerable amounts of aviation fuel. Even if the ship is nuclear-powered, she must be accompanied by a tanker to conduct RAS (Replenishment At Sea) at frequent intervals. If you have to conduct RAS with an auxiliary tanker anyway, it is not a big effort to refuel the ship at the same time. The escorts ships that will nearly always accompany the carrier are also conventionally-powered so nuclear powered carrier does not eliminate the need for RAS. The 4 Tide class tankers that will soon be joining the RFA can replenish the Queen Elizabeth Class with aviation fuel and diesel simultaneously, using rigs plugged into receiving points on the carrier’s port side. The US Navy has to operate in the Pacific where distances can be huge. Nuclear propulsion may make more sense in the vast Pacific but how frequently will the Queen Elizabeth Class be deployed over huge distances where there are no refuelling opportunities?
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