Finnish utility Fortum Power and Heat Oy has submitted an application to Finland’s Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment to operate the two reactors at the Loviisa nuclear power plant through 2050. The current operating licenses for Loviisa-1 and -2 expire in 2027 and 2030, respectively.

The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and the Department of Energy cohosted the White House Summit on Developing a Bold Decadal Vision for Commercial Fusion Energy on March 17. The livestreamed event brought together fusion leaders from government, industry, academia, and other stakeholder groups to showcase recent achievements in fusion research and discuss the administration’s strategy to support the development of commercial fusion energy. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm’s announcement of a new agency-wide fusion energy initiative and a funding opportunity worth $50 million for magnetic confinement fusion research made March 17 a lucky day indeed for the U.S. fusion energy community.

The ANS Education, Training and Workforce Development Division hosted a webinar titled “Securing a Strong Workforce for the Next Generation of Reactors” on March 16. The webinar covered actions being taken to prepare the future nuclear workforce for the construction and operation of next-generation reactors in the late 2020s and early 2030s.

Barrasso

In the latest effort by the federal government to sanction Russia over its invasion of Ukraine, Sen. John Barrasso (R., Wyo.) last week introduced legislation to prohibit the importation of Russian uranium to the United States.

The Biden administration banned imports of Russian oil, liquefied natural gas, and coal, via executive order on March 8.

Barrasso’s bill, S. 3856, was introduced on March 16, with three of his fellow GOP lawmakers as cosponsors: Sens. Kevin Cramer (R., N.D.), Cynthia Lummis (R., Wyo.), and Roger Marshall (R., Kan.).

“The time is now to permanently remove all Russian energy from the American marketplace,” said Barrasso, ranking member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources (ENR) Committee. “We know Vladimir Putin uses this money to help fund his brutal and unprovoked war in Ukraine. While banning imports of Russian oil, gas, and coal is an important step, it cannot be the last. Banning Russian uranium imports will further defund Russia’s war machine, help revive American uranium production, and increase our national security.”

Smart Growth America—in partnership with the National Association of Development Organizations, the Center for Creative Land Recycling, and the Nuclear Decommissioning Collaborative—is hosting a webinar titled “Nuclear Communities Forum 2022” on Friday, April 1, from 11 a.m. to 3:15 p.m. (EDT).

Register now. The webinar is free and open to all.

In a move motivated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the sky-high energy prices hitting Europe as a result, the Belgian government last Friday announced its intention to extend the operational life of two of its nuclear power reactors, Doel-4 and Tihange-3, through 2035.

In the 13 months since a fuel element failure triggered a scram of the research reactor at the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s NIST Center for Neutron Research (NCNR), the event and its causes have been scrutinized by both NIST and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Initial conclusions from an NRC special inspection released on March 16 confirm that while public health and safety was maintained during and after the event, and doses to reactor facility staff were well below regulatory limits, a safety limit was violated when the temperature of the fuel cladding of a single fuel element in the 20-MWt research reactor reached a temperature high enough to partially melt the element.

Europeans are taking resolute steps to reduce their output of climate-changing gases, but some countries are moving in the wrong direction.

Many countries are adding solar and wind, which are low-carbon energy sources. Some have moved to biomass, the value of which as a climate cure is not clear. A few are adding reactors, while others are defining nuclear as dirty energy and natural gas as “clean” and are changing their generation mix accordingly.

The State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate of Ukraine (SNRIU) informed the International Atomic Energy Agency yesterday that all safety systems at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in southeastern Ukraine were fully functional, one day after the site lost connection to a third external power line linking it to the national electricity grid.

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee met yesterday to consider the nomination of Kathryn Huff to head the Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy (NE). President Biden selected Huff to fill the top spot at NE in January.

The 2022 ANS Election is underway. Ballots were sent to ANS members via email on February 22, with a unique access link and access key from the third-party election services firm ElectionBuddy. Ballots must be submitted by 1 p.m. (EDT) on Tuesday, April 12.

A magnitude 7.3 earthquake struck off the east coast of Honshu, Japan, at 11:36 p.m. (local time) yesterday, resulting in significant ground shaking near the epicenter, much structural damage, at least four deaths, and a power outage affecting more than 2 million households, including some 700,000 in Tokyo. (According to Japanese utility Tepco, power was restored to all households by 2:52 a.m. on Thursday.)

The 2022 ANS election is now underway. Ballots were sent to ANS members via email on February 22, with a unique access link and access key from the third-party election services firm ElectionBuddy. Ballots must be submitted by 1 p.m. (EDT) on Tuesday, April 12.

This past October, the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM) and its contractor Isotek successfully completed processing and disposing the low-dose inventory of uranium-233 stored at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), ending a two-year effort that has eliminated a portion of the site’s legacy nuclear material and provided rare nuclear isotopes for next-generation cancer treatment research.

Without a plan for addressing issues in completing construction projects at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, the Department of Energy cannot ensure that further cost increases and schedule delays will not continue, according to a report by the Government Accountability Office. In particular, the GAO said, the DOE has not developed a corrective action plan to address root causes identified for the rising cost and the delay in building a new ventilation system at the transuranic waste repository.

Nebraska Public Power District and Entergy have agreed to terminate their nearly 20-year-old support services agreement for the Cooper nuclear power plant.

NPPD said on Monday that it intends to continue operating the plant—Nebraska’s sole power-generating nuclear facility—and will use Entergy and other available industry resources, as appropriate.

The United States must ramp up the domestic production of high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU), the panelists agreed during a March 11 members-only webinar held amid heightened concerns about energy security following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and the day after Congress approved $45 million for the HALEU Availability Program for fiscal year 2022.

John Starkey, ANS director of public policy, moderated the webinar, which featured panelists Scott Kopple, senior director of government relations at BWX Technologies; Everett Redmond, senior technical advisor at the Nuclear Energy Institute; Benjamin Reinke, senior director of corporate strategy and advisor to the CEO at X-energy; Patrick White, project manager at the Nuclear Innovation Alliance (NIA); and Brad Williams, a member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee staff.

A recording of the webinar is available to ANS members.

According to a report published by the World Economic Forum, the top two skills that will help humans thrive in the fourth industrial revolution (i.e., the age of machine learning and artificial intelligence) are critical thinking and complex problem-solving.

My journey of discovery spans nearly four decades and four careers: the U.S. Navy, commercial nuclear power, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and consulting for the federal government. Along this journey, I was fortunate to gain a vast amount of experience in solving complex problems through the teachings of W. Edwards Deming, Joseph M. Juran, and others.

An article posted on the Interesting Engineering website on March 10 highlights a recent YouTube video that provides an overview of the advantages, current status, future possibilities, and practical challenges of small modular reactors, along with a look at the even smaller microreactors. The video is available on the “Undecided with Matt Ferrell” channel. Ferrell describes himself as “a UI/UX [user interface/user experience] designer by trade” and “a lifelong tech enthusiast.”

The election last week of Yoon Suk Yeol as president of South Korea has provided a big boost for that nation’s nuclear energy-related stocks. Yoon, of the conservative People Power Party, defeated Lee Jae-myung, of the incumbent liberal Democratic Party, on a pro-nuclear platform. As reported by marketwatch.com, Yoon has promised to “reinvigorate the nuclear-energy industry by reactivating suspended atomic power plants and resuming building new ones.”