GAIN’s leadership begins with the end in mind

Christine King is director of the DOE’s GAIN

The possibilities of new advanced nuclear for the future are undeniably exciting. For me, nuclear energy has provided a career filled with lifelong learning and a global community interested in collaboration. Not every industry is fortunate in this regard. As I look to this exciting future of nuclear, I keep coming back to this advice: “Begin with the end in mind.”

In November 2015, the Department of Energy established the Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear (GAIN) for just that purpose. At GAIN, we get up every day to imagine what nuclear could be and identify concrete actions we can take to turn vision into reality. No doubt we have a long way to go, but a lot has changed in the short period of time since GAIN’s inception. Today, we are designing demonstration units to build within this decade. Soon, we will be commercializing and deploying these technologies.