A notice of opportunity from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission was published in the November 22 Federal Register to intervene in an adjudicatory hearing on Kairos Power’s application for a construction permit to build the Hermes 2 test reactor facility in Oak Ridge, Tenn.

Dustin Duncan, Saskatchewan’s minister responsible for SaskPower (from left), and Todd Smith, Ontario’s minister of energy, at the master services agreement announcement in Regina, Saskatchewan. (Photo: OPG)

Ontario Power Generation and its Laurentis Energy Partners (LEP) subsidiary have announced details of a master services agreement with SaskPower to further Saskatchewan’s plans for small modular reactor deployment.

The agreement, announced on November 20, runs for up to five years and serves as a foundation for a long-term strategic partnership to streamline SMR development in the province. LEP is tasked in the agreement with program management, licensing, and operational readiness activities.

The Philippines generates none of its electricity from nuclear energy. Until recently, it was even without a functioning research and training reactor. The lack of a nuclear facility has led to a dearth of scientific expertise in nuclear science and nuclear engineering in this nation of roughly 117 million people. Twenty-nine-year-old Ronald Daryll E. Gatchalian is on a mission to change that.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has issued a final rule and associated regulatory guide applying risk-informed, performance-based emergency preparedness (EP) requirements to small modular reactors and other new technologies (ONT).

Wisconsin-based fusion technology company SHINE Technologies has signed a long-term supply agreement with Nucleus RadioPharma for the supply of lutetium-177, a radioisotope used in cancer treatment therapies, including those in development for the treatment of neuroendocrine tumors, prostate cancer, and other solid tumors.

Contractors at the Department of Energy’s Paducah Site teamed up recently to highlight career opportunities available at the site during the Paducah Area Chamber of Commerce WKY (West Kentucky) Launch Experience.

Patrick O’Brien

As someone who grew up in a community with an operating nuclear plant—Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station, in Plymouth, Mass., on Cape Cod Bay—I had the luxury of a more thorough education on what nuclear power was (and what it wasn’t) from an early age. Unfortunately, growing up in the 1980s and ’90s, many of my contemporaries were not as lucky; their education on nuclear power came from The Simpsons.

While it is a show that influenced a generation in many ways, its portrayal of the nuclear industry had no basis in reality. Nuclear workers are among the most professional and highly trained people in the world. The standards by which used fuel and waste are handled and stored are some of the strictest of any industry. I have found, after nearly a decade in the nuclear industry, that the first thing I must help the public, media, and even elected officials understand is that used nuclear fuel is not green goo in a barrel, but a solid pellet stored safely in robust dry storage casks. Providing the facts—the science and technology—is the key to helping people understand a complex industry. Doing so in simple terms can help demystify nuclear power.

The Department of Energy’s Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations issued a draft environmental assessment (EA) in early November for a test and fill facility (TFF) that TerraPower plans to build in Kemmerer, Wyo.—the town selected two years ago to host the company’s first Natrium sodium fast reactor. The draft EA, open for comment through December 1, describes TerraPower’s plans to construct a nonnuclear facility that would safely store about 400,000 gallons of sodium to test coolant system designs and ultimately fill the planned reactor.

The United States and the Philippines last week signed a civil nuclear cooperation agreement—known in policy wonk jargon as a 123 Agreement.

As countries increasingly plan to adopt or expand nuclear energy to their energy grids, the importance of national and international nuclear law was underscored in recent remarks by Rafael Mariano Grossi, the International Atomic Energy Agency’s director general.

BWX Technologies subsidiary BWXT Medical has agreed to provide Fusion Pharmaceuticals with generators to produce actinium-225, a medical isotope used to treat cancer in clinical trials.

The United States will spearhead a pledge at the upcoming COP28 summit in Dubai to triple the world’s nuclear power capacity by 2050, according to a November 15 Bloomberg exclusive.

In October, staff at Kairos Power’s testing and manufacturing facility in Albuquerque, N. M., began transferring 14 tons of molten fluoride salt coolant into an Engineering Test Unit (ETU)—the largest transfer of FLiBe (a mixture of lithium fluoride and beryllium fluoride) since the Molten Salt Reactor Experiment in 1969.

Ultra Safe Nuclear has signed a cooperative agreement with the Manila Electric Company (Meralco)—the Philippines’ largest electric distribution utility—to study the potential deployment of one or more of the company’s high-temperature, gas-cooled microreactors in the Philippines. The agreement, signed November 15, builds on a partnership between the two companies that was announced in August.

Blaming “the criminal actions of the ruscists,” Ukraine nuclear plant operator Energoatom this morning reported a primary-to-secondary reagent leak at Unit 5 of the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant (ZNPP), as well as a partial blackout at the facility earlier this week. (The term “ruscist” [рашизм] is a portmanteau of the words “Russian” and “fascist.”)

About 150 students attended the first ever Nuclear Connection Science Fair last week, held in Oxford, U.K., and hosted by Nuclear Waste Services (NWS) and Women in Nuclear (WiN UK).

In response to Ontario’s ambitious nuclear development plans—including the plan by Ontario Power Generation to construct four small modular reactors at its Darlington nuclear site—Celeros Flow Technology has committed to expanding its Burlington, Ontario, facility to make it the first Ontario-based manufacturer of nuclear-qualified pumps, OPG announced last week.

Halden, Norway, known in nuclear circles for its long-running (1958–2018) research reactor, is partnering with Norsk Kjernekraft (aka Norwegian Nuclear Power) and Østfold Energi, a hydro, wind, and heat energy provider, to explore the idea of siting a small modular reactor plant in the municipality, located in southeastern Norway, near the border with Sweden.

Put nuclear technology in space or on the moon, and just as on Earth it can provide a power density unmatched by any other source. But what roles can nuclear power and propulsion play as the world enters a 21st-century space race? That was a key question put to six speakers during the November 14 American Nuclear Society Winter Meeting plenary session “Space: The (Next) Nuclear Frontier.”

The European Commission intends to establish early next year an industrial alliance focused on small modular reactors, EC energy commissioner Kadri Simson announced last week.