Nuclear News

Connecting nuclear engineers and scientists with space exploration missions has been a focus of the American Nuclear Society’s Aerospace Nuclear Science and Technology Division since its creation in 2008. One of the main ways those connections are made is through the Nuclear and Emerging Technologies for Space (NETS) conference, which the division supports in conjunction with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

Research into the high-resolution detection of plutonium mixtures by Purdue University professor Rusi Taleyarkhan and his team was featured on the cover of the February issue of the Journal of Analytical Atomic Spectroscopy, published by the British Royal Society of Chemistry.

The published research focuses on novel hybrid mass-alpha spectroscopy technology. Taleyarkhan and his team applied centrifugally tensioned metastable fluid detector sensor technology to the detection of mixtures of plutonium-239/240. This technology can serve as an alternative to conventional alpha radiation spectroscopy sensors and to mass spectroscopy systems, which can take weeks to deploy and are cost-prohibitive, especially when deployed in low-radiation fields for long periods of time.

Now is such an exciting time to be a nuclear engineering student. We are seeing decades of work culminate in technology that can soon be deployed. The nuclear energy sector is experiencing growing support as more people recognize and accept the role that nuclear power has in decarbonizing our electric grid.

From left: Kalev Kallemets, chief executive officer of Fermi Energia, and James Lauritsen, managing director of Laurentis Energy Partners. (Photo: Fermi Energia)

Laurentis Energy Partners will work with Fermi Energia to support the development of small modular reactors in Estonia, the companies announced yesterday at the 2022 Canadian Nuclear Association Conference being held in Ottawa, Ontario.

A subsidiary of Ontario Power Generation (OPG), Laurentis bills itself as a provider of SMR services throughout the development life cycle, from feasibility and planning through construction, commissioning, and operations. Fermi Energia is an Estonian energy company focused on SMR development and deployment.

What they’re saying: “Building on our owner’s engineer and nuclear management experience, Laurentis is pleased to work with Fermi Energia to provide an opportunity for Estonia to confidently introduce SMRs into their energy mix,” stated Jason Van Wart, vice president of Laurentis.

The Department of Energy announced on April 11 that it will distribute $1 million to three awardees to evaluate newly developed radioisotopes for potential therapeutic use in preclinical and clinical trials. The funding is provided by the DOE Isotope Program, which produces isotopes for use in science, medicine, and industry that would otherwise be unavailable or in short supply.

Risch

Manchin

Sens. Joe Manchin (D., W.Va.) and Jim Risch (R., Idaho) recently introduced the International Nuclear Energy Act of 2022, a measure aimed at developing a strategy to counter the growing influence of Russia and China on the global civil nuclear export market.

Manchin is chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, and Risch is the ranking member of the Foreign Relations Committee.

Bill basics: The legislation, according to the lawmakers, would:

• Establish an office to coordinate civil nuclear exports strategy, establish financing relationships, promote regulatory harmonization, enhance safeguards and security, promote standardization of licensing framework, and create an export working group.

The Department of Energy has determined that the sale, lease, or transfer of up to 750 kilograms of high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) per calendar year to support the production of molybdenum-99 will not have an adverse material impact on the domestic uranium mining, conversion, or enrichment industry.

From left: Bonnie Jenkins, the U.S. State Department’s undersecretary for arms control and international security, and Jānis Vitenbergs, Latvia’s economics minister. (Photo: U.S. State Department)

The U.S. and Latvian governments announced last week a new partnership under the Biden administration’s Foundational Infrastructure for Responsible Use of Small Modular Reactor Technology (FIRST) program.

Launched in April of last year, the FIRST program is designed to deepen strategic ties, support energy innovation, and advance technical collaboration with partner nations on nuclear energy infrastructure.

The U.S.-Latvia FIRST project, according to the State Department, will draw on expertise from across government, industry, national laboratories, and academia for policy and technical exchanges focused on topics such as workforce development, stakeholder engagement, regulatory development, and familiarization with advanced nuclear technologies—including SMRs—to support Latvia’s energy independence and security and climate priorities. Latvia currently has no nuclear power facilities.

What they’re saying: “We are pleased to be working with Latvia to explore what role advanced nuclear technologies can play in Latvia’s future energy mix,” said Bonnie Jenkins, the State Department’s undersecretary for arms control and international security. “The United States and Latvia share a commitment to energy security, combatting climate change, and nonproliferation. The FIRST program provides a framework for our countries to work together to achieve these goals.

TRISO-X submitted a license application for a high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) fuel fabrication facility to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on April 6, the day after parent company X-energy announced that TRISO-X had secured a 110-acre site in Oak Ridge, Tenn., for the construction of the facility, which it is aiming to have operating in 2025.

The U.K. government has released a new energy strategy aimed at boosting Britain’s energy independence, stabilizing its soaring energy prices, and accelerating the deployment of new nuclear, wind, solar, and hydrogen to mitigate climate change.

At the same time, the 38-page document, British Energy Security Strategy, calls for near-term support for domestic oil and gas, stating, “Net zero is a smooth transition, not an immediate extinction, for oil and gas.” (The United Kingdom in 2019 became the first of the world’s major economies to embrace a legal obligation to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.)

Following through with this strategy, the government says, could result in low-carbon sources generating up to 95 percent of British electricity by 2030.

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign formed a partnership with Ultra Safe Nuclear Corporation to deploy an advanced research reactor on campus, based on a microreactor design that improves upon well-established high-temperature, gas-cooled reactor (HTGR) technology. Unlike traditional research reactors, our focus at UIUC is not on a laboratory tool to study radiation interactions with matter, or even on the production of radioisotopes. Instead, we will build a research, education, and training facility intended to help advanced reactor technology become a widely deployable, marketable, economic, safe, and reliable option for a clean energy future. If successful, the USNC-designed Micro Modular Reactor (MMR)^a would operate on UIUC’s campus with the capability to advance critical and enabling technologies required for advanced reactors to realize their full potential, while educating and training the workforce as a key step toward delivering on the technology’s promise. Microreactors can become a transformative distributed energy technology and revolutionize energy infrastructure worldwide.

On April 7, U.S. Sen. John Barrasso (R., Wyo.), ranking member of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, introduced the Fueling Our Nuclear Future Act of 2022. The bill would ensure a domestic supply of high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) for advanced nuclear reactors by directing the Department of Energy to prioritize establishing a domestic HALEU enrichment capability and to use enriched uranium held by the DOE and the National Nuclear Security Administration to fuel advanced reactor demonstrations until U.S. commercial enrichment is available. The bill explicitly excludes uranium sourced or processed by any entity owned or controlled by the governments of Russia and China.

Bruce Power and Ontario Power Generation (OPG) have announced an agreement to work together to support new nuclear technologies in Ontario. Bruce Power operates the Bruce nuclear plant and OPG operates the Darlington and Pickering facilities.

With the aim of contributing to the United Kingdom’s effort to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2050, the UK Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Association (UK HFCA) has launched the Nuclear Enabled Hydrogen Working Group.

Westinghouse’s plans for supplying AP1000 reactors to Ukraine may have been complicated by Russia’s invasion of the country, but the company is nonetheless continuing its efforts to strengthen business ties in Central and Eastern Europe. On April 5, Westinghouse signed memorandums of understanding with three companies in Slovenia.

Energy Harbor—owner and operator of the Beaver Valley, Davis-Besse, and Perry nuclear power plants—recently announced its plan to become a carbon-free energy infrastructure and supply firm in 2023. Energy Harbor is based in Akron, Ohio.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission yesterday unveiled its Strategic Plan: Fiscal Years 2022-2026, providing what it terms “a blueprint for how the agency will plan, implement, and monitor the work needed to ensure the safe and secure use of radioactive materials.”

According to the NRC, the four-year plan also includes a new focus on efforts to inspire stakeholder confidence and to continue fostering a healthy organization.

From the chairman: The 38-page document includes a message from the NRC chairman, Christopher Hanson: “In expanding the strategic plan to incorporate these areas of focus, I believe that this strategic plan will serve the agency better over the next four years by providing a clear roadmap that can be utilized in budget development and the agency’s ongoing implementation of the Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act of 2018."

X-energy has announced that its wholly owned subsidiary, TRISO-X, plans to build the TRISO-X Fuel Fabrication Facility, dubbed TF3, at the Horizon Center Industrial Park in Oak Ridge, Tenn. X-energy has produced kilogram quantities of fuel at its pilot plant at Oak Ridge National Laboratory through a public-private partnership.

The commercial plant will use high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) to produce TRISO particles, which are fabricated into fuel forms, including the spherical graphite “pebbles” needed to fuel the company’s Xe-100 high-temperature gas reactor. Site preparation and construction are expected to get underway in 2022, and commissioning and start-up are scheduled for as early as 2025, according to X-energy.

In its latest report on the climate, released yesterday, the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) declares the need for immediate and deep emissions reductions across all sectors for the world to stand a realistic chance of limiting the increase in global warming to 1.5°C (2.7°F).

Polskie Elektrownie Jadrowe (PEJ)—the state-owned company set up to lead Poland’s effort to build nuclear power plants—has submitted an environmental impact report to the country’s General Directorate for Environmental Protection regarding the construction and operation of the first such facility, which is to have a total capacity of up to 3,750 MWe.