An article in the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency’s July news bulletin noted that a first test has been completed for the High Burnup Experiments in Reactivity Initiated Accident (HERA) project. The project aim is to understand the performance of light water reactor fuel at high burnup under reactivity-initiated accidents (RIA).

The Manhattan Project is usually considered to have been initiated with Albert Einstein’s letter to President Franklin Roosevelt in October 1939. However, a lesser-known document that was just as impactful on wartime nuclear history was the so-called Frisch-Peierls memorandum. Prepared by two refugee physicists at the University of Birmingham in Britain in early 1940, this manuscript was the first technical description of nuclear weapons and their military, strategic, and ethical implications to reach high-level government officials on either side of the Atlantic. The memorandum triggered the initiation of the British wartime nuclear program, which later merged with the Manhattan Engineer District.

With the signing of a memorandum of understanding between U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Malaysian Foreign Minister Mohamad Hasan, a nuclear future for Malaysia is back on the table.

Helical Fusion, a private fusion start-up based in Japan, announced it has closed its first round of venture capital financing, securing ¥2.3 billion ($15.6 million) in funding. According to Helical Fusion, this brings the company’s total capital investment—including grants and loans—to ¥5.2 billion ($35.3 million).

In commercial nuclear power, there has always been a deliberate tension between the regulator and the utility owner. The regulator fundamentally exists to protect the worker, and the utility, to make a profit. It is a win-win balance.

From the U.S. nuclear industry has emerged a brilliantly successful occupational nuclear safety record—largely the result of an ALARA (as low as reasonably achievable) process that has driven exposure rates down to what only a decade ago would have been considered unthinkable. In the U.S. nuclear industry, the system has accomplished an excellent, nearly seamless process that succeeds to the benefit of both employee and utility owner.

Zeldin

In a recent interview on New York radio station 77 WABC, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency Lee Zeldin talked with host John Catsimatidis about the near-term future of the domestic nuclear industry and the role the EPA will play in the sector.

Catsimatidis kicked off the interview by asking if the U.S. will be able to reach total energy independence. Zeldin responded by saying that decreasing energy dependence on other countries, especially adversaries, was a top priority for him and the Trump administration.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is considering allowing Entergy to use a portion of the decommissioning trust fund (DTF) for the Arkansas Nuclear One nuclear power plant to dispose of several major radioactive components (MRC) that have been taken out of service at the two-unit pressurized water reactor.

Sandia National Laboratories is collaborating with the California-based Aeva Technologies, a developer of next-generation sensing and perception systems, on the development of technology for strengthening security at U.S. nuclear reactor sites.

The American Nuclear Society joined seven other organizations to send a letter to Energy Secretary Christopher Wright on July 8, asking to meet with him to discuss “the restoration of a highly functioning program to meet DOE’s legal responsibility to manage and dispose of the nation’s commercial and legacy defense spent nuclear fuel (SNF) and high-level radioactive waste (HLW).”

As the U.K. government looks to finalize investment decisions for the construction of the Sizewell C nuclear power plant this summer, France’s state-owned EDF has announced plans to take a 12.5 percent stake in the project and commit up to £1.1 billion ($1.5 billion) in funding.

A recent article in the Chicago Tribune explores the benefits and potential drawbacks of the 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA) signed by Constellation Energy and Meta last month.

Bellevue, Wash.–based TerraPower has awarded three supplier contracts to U.S. companies to support its Natrium demonstration project, construction of which began in June 2024 in Kemmerer, Wyo. The new contracts represent the fifth round of procurement awards for the Natrium project.

Shine Technologies has been developing fusion-adjacent technologies in Janesville, Wis., including nuclear fuel recycling, since its founding in 2005. Standard Nuclear of Oak Ridge, Tenn., was formed just last year but holds a TRISO fuel production technology backed by years of research and development since it acquired Ultra Safe Nuclear’s fuel manufacturing assets after that company’s bankruptcy in October 2024. Now, Shine and Standard Nuclear have announced plans to work together on a “strategic partnership to advance nuclear fuel recycling and U.S. fuel security.”

Craig Piercy
cpiercy@ans.org

So, President Trump has just kicked the low-dose radiation hornets’ nest.

Specifically, his recently signed executive order “Ordering the Reform of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission” calls for the NRC to “reconsider reliance” on the linear no-threshold (LNT) theory and the ALARA (as low as reasonably achievable) standard for radiation protection.

This directive will certainly reignite a vociferous debate within the radiation research community over the continued efficacy of using LNT as the basis for protecting the public and the environment, a community that has been wracked with controversy on this matter for the last few years.

I must admit that whenever the low-dose issue comes up, my first thoughts always go to Sayre’s Law.

The University of Michigan’s Department of Nuclear Engineering and Radiological Sciences (NERS) has published a summary of a study on nuclear microreactors and machine learning (ML) that was conducted by researchers from NERS and Idaho National Laboratory. The full paper, “Nuclear Microreactor Transient and Load-Following Control with Deep Reinforcement Learning,” was featured in the July issue of Energy Conversion and Management: X.

Texas-based Vistra Corporation has announced that its license renewal application for the Perry nuclear power plant was approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The plant first connected to the grid in 1986 and is still operating under its original 40-year license, which was set to expire next year.

The Department of Energy said it anticipated delivering a research cask of high-burnup spent nuclear fuel from Dominion Energy’s North Anna nuclear power plant in Virginia to Idaho National Laboratory by fall 2027. The planned shipment is part of the High Burnup Dry Storage Research Project being conducted by the DOE with the Electric Power Research Institute.

As preparations continue, the DOE said it is working closely with federal agencies as well as tribal and state governments along potential transportation routes to ensure safety, transparency, and readiness every step of the way.

Watch the DOE’s latest video outlining the project here.

A recent appropriation from the Texas legislature and signed by Gov. Greg Abbott directs funding to Texas Tech University to accelerate “produced water” research in partnership with Abilene Christian University and Natura Resources and to complete the construction of a molten salt research reactor at ACU.

The International Atomic Energy Agency has initiated a coordinated research project that will combine an “innovative, non-invasive, and scalable nuclear technique”—gamma-ray spectrometry (GRS)—with drones and satellite imagery to gather and analyze data that can reveal the quality of soil on agricultural lands around the world.