- Molten Salt Reactor at ACU Gets NRC Construction Permit
- Aalo Atomics To Negotiate PPA with Idaho Falls Power
- Rolls-Royce Wins SMR Partnership With CEZ
- Holtec Chooses South Yorkshire for Its SMR Factory
- Westinghouse Submits Preliminary Safety Design Report to Site eVinci Test Reactor at INL
Molten Salt Reactor at ACU Gets NRC Construction Permit
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has issued a construction permit for the deployment of the Natura Resources’ MSR-1 system at Abilene Christian University (ACU). This action by the regulatory agency marks the first construction permit for a liquid-fueled advanced reactor and only the second for any advanced reactor issued by the NRC.
The molten salt research reactor (MSRR) will to provide valuable operational data to support Natura’s 100MWe systems and will also serve as a world-class research tool to train advanced reactor operators and educate students.
Conceptual Diagram of the ACU Molten Salt Reactor.
Image: NRC Submitted by ACU
In a press statement the NRC noted, “This is the first research reactor project we’ve approved for construction in decades, and the staff successfully worked with ACU to resolve several technical issues with this novel design,” said Andrea Veil, Director of the NRC’s Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation.
“Going forward, we’ll have inspectors on the ACU campus when construction gets started.”
The MSRR, which will not generate electricity, will use molten salt coolant with fuel dissolved in the salt. The facility will provide a platform to research molten-salt technology, as well as educational opportunities in nuclear science and engineering. The permit only authorizes construction; ACU will have to submit a separate application for an operating license in the future.
The NRC accepted ACU’s application to build the reactor and began the regulatory review in November 2022. ACU submitted updates in November 2023 and July 2024. The NRC issued its final environmental assessment for the site on March 7, and the final safety evaluation for the permit on September 16.
While this is a significant milestone, there is still work to be done.The advanced reactor deployment site that will house the reactor, the Science and Engineering Research Center at ACU, was completed in August 2023, and the issuance of the construction permit allows the team to begin fabrication of the reactor.
Zachry Nuclear Engineering will complete the Detailed Engineering and Design of the Natura MSR-1 in the first part of 2025, which will be followed quickly by the submission of the Operating License application to the NRC.
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) provides fuel for the current operating fleet of university research reactors, and its commitment in 2019 to provide fuel and salt for the MSRR was the impetus for Natura Resources to develop and deploy the Natura MSR-1 with ACU.
The fuel and salt needs for the MSRR are unique, and Natura Resources and ACU are committed to working with the DOE to finalize details related to the provision of fuel and salt.
Natura Resources has taken an iterative, milestone-based approach to advanced reactor development and deployment, focused on efficiency and performance.
Natura Resources LLC selected Abilene Christian University to lead a $30.5 million effort to design, license and build a molten salt research reactor in collaboration with three other major universities.
The effort started in 2020 when Natura brought together ACU’s NEXT Lab with Texas A&M University, the University of Texas, and the Georgia Institute of Technology to form the Natura Resources Research Alliance. In only four years, Natura and its partners have developed a system that the NRC has successfully licensed.
Douglass Robison, Founder and President, of Natura Resources, said, “Natura recognized early on that the NRC is the gold standard of licensing of nuclear reactors. We made a conscious decision to work with the NRC to license our technology for deployment here in the States rather than taking our technology outside their jurisdiction or attempting to avoid the licensing process entirely. The NRC’s issuance of the Construction Permit for the Natura MSR-1 deployment at ACU shows that our technology can be licensed and de-risks the licensure of Natura’s 100MWe systems.”
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Aalo Atomics To Negotiate PPA with Idaho Falls Power
- Power purchase deal sought with Idaho Falls Power
(NucNet) Municipal electric utility Idaho Falls Power and Texas-based nuclear startup Aalo Atomics have entered negotiations for a power purchase agreement (PPA) that may support the deployment of seven factory-built Aalo-1 reactors, totaling 75 MW of power generation. Aalo said in a statement a memorandum of understanding was signed with Idaho Falls Power to initiate the process.
Yasir Arafat, founder and chief technology officer at Aalo, said on social media that his team will be working over the next 9-12 months to “to negotiate a PPA to seal the deal.”
Aalo said the choice of Idaho Falls as the project’s site is “strategic”, building on the region’s rich history of nuclear innovation as home to the Idaho National Laboratory (INL), which has long been a center for nuclear advancements.
In May 2024, the company announced it had completed the conceptual design of the Aalo-1, a factory-fabricated 10 MW sodium-cooled microreactor that uses uranium zirconium hydride fuel, also known as Triga fuel.
Aalo Atomics plans to build first a full-scale, non-nuclear prototype of the reactor, Aalo-0, at its Austin headquarters. It will be used to test and refine the technology. The company said it also plans to build an experimental reactor, Aalo-X, at an INL site, but no timeline has been provided.
In July, the startup submitted a pre-application regulatory engagement plan with the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). The company said it was aiming to submit a full combined licence application in 2026.
According to Bear Prairie, general manager of Idaho Falls Power, the utility industry is facing “major challenges” meeting demands while still maintaining affordable reliable service.
“Aalo’s innovative approach to advanced nuclear with no emissions appears to have the right risk and economics for our utility to take this next step,” said Prairie.
Idaho Falls Power said in a separate statement that under the agreement, Aalo would lease land for the life of the project, up to 80 years, at the utility’s new energy research park. With design, approval and construction, Aalo’s Idaho Falls Project is not expected to come online before 2030.
“A partnership with Aalo whereby we provide space for modelling and development at our energy research park while it develops and proves its technology at INL just makes sense,” said Idaho Falls mayor Rebecca Casper.
“The potential benefits are highly significant. There is simply no downside to supporting energy development here in eastern Idaho.”
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Rolls-Royce Wins SMR Partnership With CEZ
- UK company wins bid among seven candidates
(NucNet) Czech state-controlled utility CEZ will establish a strategic partnership with UK-based Rolls-Royce SMR for the development of small modular reactors (SMR), prime-minister Petr Fiala told a press conference on 9/18/24.
A government statement said the partnership will be concluded on the condition that Rolls-Royce SMR passes a standard security assessment test. Fiala said Prague is not interested to “only build” new SMR plants but participate in their production on a global scale.
“The establishment of a strategic partnership between CEZ and Rolls-Royce SMR will be a great opportunity for Czech companies, which have many years of experience in the nuclear industry,” Fiala said.
The government said CEZ plans to build the first SMR plant in the Czech Republic near the existing Temelin nuclear station. It is expected to be built in the first half of the 2030s before any new large-scale units come online.
CEZ chief executive Daniel Benes said the strategic partnership with Rolls-Royce SMR will allow the company to combine its long-term experience with nuclear energy with “the high technological maturity” of its new UK partner. Benes said that CEZ will now negotiate a specific form of cooperation with Rolls-Royce SMR.
Rolls-Royce SMR chief executive Chris Cholerton welcomed the decision of the Czech government to name the UK company as preferred supplier for the development and construction of SMR plants. Cholerton also confirmed Rolls-Royce SMR was selected from a list of seven potential SMR technology providers.
Rolls-Royce has said its SMR will be factory-built, enabling easier transportation, reduced completion risk, and increased build time certainty. The SMR plant is to have an output of 470 MW.
The Czech government approved an SMR deployment roadmap in 2023. Prague also wants to deploy two large-scale reactor units at Dukovany in the late 2030s and potentially at Temelin in the 2040s.
Rolls-Royce told the UK Mail that it has similar deals pending due to being short listed for contract awards in Sweden and the Netherlands. The Mail reported the firm has been shortlisted by Vattenfall, the Swedish multinational power company, to meet rising demand for electricity.
In The Netherlands, Rolls has signed an exclusive agreement with Dutch development firm ULC-Energy to work together to deploy SMRs in the country. Rolls is awaiting government approval from both countries.
Earlier this year, the Polish government gave the green light for state-owned Industria to construct a power plant working with Rolls’s SMR technology.
The Rolls-Royce SMR is actually a mid-range PWR rated at $470 MWe.
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Holtec Chooses South Yorkshire for Its SMR Factory
South Yorkshire in the UK is set to become the new home of US nuclear energy company, Holtec’s planned new small modular reactor (SMR) factory. The Holtec SMR factory represents a major £1.5 billion ($2 billion) investment and job creation opportunity for region.
Holtec’s SMR factory will see at least 70% of materials, components and work done within the UK and particularly South Yorkshire meaning significant supply chain opportunities.
Holtec’s decision comes after Rolls-Royce SMR also chose South Yorkshire to become the home of its new multi-million pound facility earlier this year. Rolls-Royce SMR will manufacture and test prototype modules for SMRs in South Yorkshire further strengthening the region’s clean tech cluster.
“Holtec’s SMR-300 is a PWR reactor enabling the factory to also produce large naval reactor components to not only support the country’s energy security, but also its national security“
World Nuclear News reported The SMR-300 is a pressurized water reactor producing 300 MW of electrical power or 1050 MW of thermal power for process applications. The company says it has undergone several design evolutions, the most recent of which is the incorporation of forced flow capability overlayed on gravity-driven flow in the plant’s primary system. Previously, Holtec configured the design for 160 MW.
The SMR-300 is one of six SMR designs selected in October last year by Great British Nuclear on a shortlist for the UK’s SMR selection competition and one of the five vendors to submit a bid by the 8 July deadline. The aim is for a final investment decision on two or three of the designs to be taken in 2029. Holtec proposes to deploy around 5 GWe of SMRs in serial production in the UK by 2050.
In December 2023, Holtec secured GBP30 million from the UK government’s Future Nuclear Enabling Fund to start the generic design assessment (GDA) process, and completed the first step last month.
The company said it is on track to begin the licensing and construction of two SMR-300 units at its Palisades nuclear power plant site in Michigan. It is aiming to file a construction permit application for the two Palisades SMRs in 2026 with the first SMR-300 plant targeted for mid-2030, subject to regulatory reviews and oversight.
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Westinghouse Submits Preliminary Safety Design Report to Site eVinci Test Reactor at INL
- Key Milestone Advances eVinci Microreactor Testing for Commercial Market
Westinghouse Electric Company announced it has submitted its eVinci[tm] Microreactor Preliminary Safety Design Report (PSDR) to the Department of Energy’s (DOE) National Reactor Innovation Center (NRIC). Westinghouse is the first reactor developer to reach this milestone in support of siting its test reactor at NRIC’s Demonstration of Microreactor Experiments (DOME) test bed at Idaho National Laboratory (INL).
The PSDR is a major milestone in the recently completed Front-End Engineering and Experiment Design (FEEED) process that Westinghouse began in October 2023. The PSDR provides comprehensive safety and operational reference materials prepared by the dedicated eVinci team of over 300 world-class engineers and follows DOE-Idaho’s approval of the eVinci Safety Design Strategy.
“The completion of the PSDR for the eVinci test reactor is an important step towards enabling a microreactor developer to perform a test in our DOME facility,” said Brad Tomer, acting director of NRIC.
“As a national DOE program and part of INL, the nation’s nuclear energy research laboratory, NRIC is committed to working with private companies such as Westinghouse to perform testing and accelerate development of advanced nuclear technologies that will provide clean energy solutions for the U.S.”
“This PSDR submission is a critical step to bringing the Westinghouse eVinci Microreactor to commercial operation,” said Jon Ball, President of eVinci Technologies at Westinghouse.
“We are targeting deployment of multiple eVinci microreactors across the world by the end of the decade, and the strong and continued partnership with INL and the Department of Energy is instrumental to our efforts.”
The eVinci microreactor team will next develop the timeline for the End-to-End Reactor test program at INL, along with a Preliminary Documented Safety Analyses submission. This will be the third of four DOE submissions needed for Westinghouse to install the test reactor in the DOME.
NRIC is a DOE national program to accelerate the development and deployment of advanced nuclear technologies like the eVinci microreactor. Its objective is to create four new experimental facilities and two large reactor test beds by 2028 for comprehensive technology demonstrations and experiments, and to finalize two advanced nuclear technology experiments by 2030.
The eVinci microreactor targets a variety of applications, including providing reliable electricity and heating for remote communities, universities, mining operations, industrial centers, data centers and defense facilities, and soon the lunar surface and beyond.
The resilient eVinci microreactor has very few moving parts, working essentially as a battery, providing the versatility for power systems ranging from several kilowatts to five megawatts of electricity, delivered 24 hours a day, seven days a week for eight-plus years without refueling.
It can also produce high temperature heat suitable for industrial applications, including alternative fuel production, such as hydrogen, and has the flexibility to balance renewable output. The technology is factory-built and assembled before it is shipped in a container.
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