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Conference Spotlight
2026 Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
August 24–27, 2026
Dallas, TX|Hilton Anatole
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Latest News
Valar’s Ward 250 reaches criticality in Utah
El Segundo, Calif.–based start-up Valar Atomics has taken its Ward 250 test reactor critical at the Utah San Rafael Energy Lab (USREL), becoming the second company in the Department of Energy's Reactor Pilot Program to reach the milestone, and, according to the DOE, the first to do so outside a national laboratory.
The DOE celebrated the achievement in a June 18 announcement, describing it as a "zero-power fueled criticality demonstration." The news follows a similar update for Antares Nuclear's Mark-0 reactor, which the DOE said achieved criticality at Idaho National Laboratory earlier this month.
Advanced Reactor Safety (ARS)
Technical Session|Panel
Wednesday, June 19, 2024|3:15–5:00PM PDT|Palm A
Session Chair:
Robert W. Youngblood
Session Organizer:
Alternate Chair:
Dennis W. Henneke
This panel will focus on two complementary undertakings: (1) RAMI (Reliability Availability Maintainability Inspectability), and (2) RIM (Reliability Integrity Management). Both involve setting targets for their respective “ilities” and managing plants to meet those targets. Setting those targets to address multiple objectives (safety, availability, cost, …) is challenging, because to some extent those objectives compete. Panelists will focus on experience in meeting that challenge.
Nathan DeKett
GE
Joon-Eon YANG
KAERI
Todd Anselmi
INL
David Blanchard
AREI
