Research engineers take a sample of molten salt for the NEXT Lab. (Photo: Jeremy Enlow/Steelshutter)
The American Nuclear Society’s Chicago–Great Lakes Local Section hosted a presentation on February 27 on developments at the molten salt research reactor at Abilene Christian University’s Nuclear Energy Experimental Testing (NEXT) Lab.
A recording of the presentation is available on the ANS website.
The presentation convened in the Behrens Conference Room at ANS headquarters in Westmont, Ill. Lester Towell, director of operations at ACU’s NEXT Lab in Texas, updated ANS members on the project’s progress and timeline as well as molten salt’s potential as the future of nuclear reactor technology.
If the project’s deployment deadline—anticipated for the fourth quarter of 2026—is met, the reactor will be the first MSRR in the United States and will pave the way for further scientific development in the field.
Quotable: “The mission of ACU’s NEXT Lab is to provide global solutions to the world’s need for energy, water, and medical isotopes by advancing the technology of molten salt reactors while educating future leaders in nuclear science and engineering,” said Towell.
Why molten salt? According to Towell, “Molten salt takes all the things that makes nuclear good and makes it better.” Beyond being safer, cleaner, and more multifunctional than traditional reactors, MSRs are “scalable across the board,” able to be built anywhere from microreactor-sized all the way to grid-sized.
MSRs are also able to use a wide variety of fuel types, including thorium and spent nuclear fuel, potentially meeting the nation’s energy and radwaste needs simultaneously.
Project details: ACU’s MSRR received a permit from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on September 16, 2024; it is the first liquid-fuel advanced reactor in the U.S. to receive such a permit. It is also the first research reactor to receive NRC approval in four decades. Towell noted “the purpose of this research reactor is to prove that we can get a license from the NRC,” highlighting how this process has laid the groundwork for future MSR construction.
The NEXT Lab is staffed by 35 full-time employees and more than 250 visiting researchers. ACU students also can work in the lab. It is funded by Natura Resources, which hopes the project is a step toward developing commercially deployable MSRs in the future.
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