Ames National Laboratory has announced a new tool that combines artificial intelligence and physics-based modeling to identify materials that can be used in fusion systems, where materials must withstand intense heat, radiation, and mechanical stress.

The University of Utah announced that it will be producing electricity with its TRIGA reactor for the first time this summer. The project is in collaboration with Elemental Nuclear Energy, and the electricity will be used to power a “mini AI data center.”

Researchers at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory are exploring methods of using artificial intelligence and machine learning to better optimize formulas for stabilizing low-activity radioactive waste in glass through the vitrification process.

The work is helping inform waste vitrification activities at the Department of Energy’s Hanford Site in Washington state. The DOE is currently commissioning the Low Activity Waste Facility at Hanford’s Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant (WTP), which will be used to vitrify portions of the site’s nearly 56 million gallons of radioactive and chemical waste.

As the United States faces surging electricity demand driven by artificial intelligence, data centers, and a push to bring manufacturing back home, Idaho National Laboratory is leading an effort to modernize and expand the nation’s nuclear power capabilities by revamping the Department of Energy’s Light Water Reactor Sustainability (LWRS) Program.

Oklo announced a new partnership with Los Alamos National Laboratory and Nvidia to perform AI-enabled research on nuclear infrastructure and fuel.

The partnership is focused on exploring plutonium-bearing fuels, including the development of science-based AI models to support fuel validation and materials science and fabrication research and development. The team will also be exploring the development of nuclear-powered AI computing centers at LANL.

The OECD Nuclear Energy Agency’s International Regulatory Laboratory (RegLab) Project, which brings together experts from across the nuclear field to examine the potential impact of emerging technologies, has released a report on its first cycle that details the outcomes of a RegLab focused on the use of artificial intelligence in real-time monitoring of nuclear power plants.

Participants started out with an initial problem/opportunity statement, from which they developed a use case and a mock safety, security, safeguards, and environmental protection (SSSE) case. Then, over the course of two workshops, participants considered these cases in depth.

The Department of Energy announced the completion of a proof-of-concept demonstration of the use of Everstar’s AI tool to generate chapter 5 of an NRC license application from preliminary safety documents.

The 208-page document was created by the AI tool in approximately one day. According to the DOE, it would typically take a team of people between four and six weeks to complete this work.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has released a notice of intent to conduct a scoping process and prepare an environmental impact statement to evaluate Fermi America’s plan to construct and operate four AP1000 reactors at its Project Matador Advanced Energy and Intelligence Campus in Texas.

While that announcement may seem routine, the process envisioned is not. As part of the company’s combined license (COL) application with the NRC, it has agreed to participate in an accelerated environmental review pilot program under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). Under this pilot, the applicant(s) develop a draft EIS under NRC supervision.

Ian Buck, Nvidia’s vice president of hyperscale and HPC computing (left), and Darío Gil, DOE Under Secretary for Science and Genesis Mission lead, at the Nvidia GPU Technology Conference. (Photo: Nvidia)

Department of Energy Under Secretary for Science and Genesis Mission lead Darío Gil participated in a session at the Nvidia GPU Technology Conference on March 17 that coincided with the announcement of the DOE’s $293 million Genesis Mission request for applications, which invites interdisciplinary teams to submit ideas for projects addressing over 20 of Genesis’s stated national challenges, several of which focus on accelerating nuclear research and nuclear energy output.

“We seek breakthrough ideas and novel collaborations leveraging the scientific prowess of our national laboratories, the private sector, universities, and science philanthropies,” said Gil.  

The nuclear space is full of companies eager to power new AI development. At the same time, many AI companies want to provide services to the nuclear industry. It should come as no surprise, then, that two new partnerships have recently been announced that further bridge the AI and nuclear sectors.

AtkinsRéalis has announced a partnership with Nvidia that aims to leverage Nvidia’s technologies to deploy “nuclear-powered, large-scale AI factories.” Centrus Energy has announced a partnership with Palantir Technologies to use Palantir’s software in support of Centrus’s plans to expand enrichment capacity.

Over the past two weeks, Argonne National Laboratory has announced numerous significant advancements being made by its staff to push forward nuclear fuels and materials research. Those announcements include the opening of the new Activated Materials Lab, the development of a new measurement technique, and the application of new artificial intelligence tools.

Craig Piercy
cpiercy@ans.org

I spent a fair amount of time over the holiday break pondering the makings of a good year for nuclear technology in 2026.

Last year was white-­hot. Between the fundamental upward shift in domestic electricity demand, the continuing proliferation of data center projects in all corners of the U.S., the increasingly voracious appetite of the financial markets for nuclear investment, and the Trump administration’s full-­throttle approach to nuclear policy, 2025 will likely be remembered as a significant, positive inflection point in the history of the harnessed atom.

I hope 2026 will be even better, but for it to be so, it will have to be different. It needs a seriousness about it, a scrape of the froth. Advanced nuclear energy technology is in a hardening phase at the moment, where the green shoots of innovation must now grow into robust commercial enterprises capable of scaling quickly and safely. Not everyone will succeed.

Idaho National Laboratory and computer chip maker Nvidia have announced a public-private partnership to advance nuclear energy deployment through artificial intelligence. According to INL, the collaboration aims to cut reactor development times in half and reduce operational costs by 50 percent by using AI to design, license, manufacture, construct, and operate reactors with human-in-the-loop workflows.

The Department of Energy’s newly published Genesis Mission National Science and Technology Challenges describes 26 challenges and corresponding AI solutions designed to advance the artificial intelligence–focused Genesis Mission, which was established by presidential executive order last November to develop an “integrated platform that connects the world’s supercomputers, experimental facilities, AI systems, and unique datasets across every major scientific domain to double the productivity and impact of American research and innovation within a decade.”

Utah-based Creekstone Energy has signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with EnergySolutions to study the feasibility of building at least 2 gigawatts of advanced nuclear capacity to power a 25-acre data center Creekstone is planning in Delta, Utah.

In a flurry of announcements this week, NextEra Energy confirmed new deals across the energy sector with Symmetry, Meta, Basin Electric, WPPI Energy, and Google. These deals are primarily focused on enabling more nuclear build-out for the artificial intelligence boom.

One of the executive orders issued by President Trump in November —“Launching the Genesis Mission”—focuses on a national effort to accelerate the use of AI in scientific research. The Genesis Mission EO preceded a reorganization of the Department of Energy and further tightens links between science and security under the administration’s quest for “global technology dominance in the development of artificial intelligence.”

As President Trump hosted Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at the White House on November 19, Energy Secretary Chris Wright confirmed that the United States and Saudi Arabia have signed a “historic” deal on cooperation in the civilian nuclear energy sector. The “Joint Declaration on the Completion of Negotiations on Civil Nuclear Cooperation” is seen as an important part to strengthen U.S. influence in the Gulf region to counter the influence of Iran, Russia, and China.

AI for energy, and energy for AI: that is the new refrain. But can nuclear power plants be deployed at the pace needed for substantial and timely contributions to the energy infrastructure? For Westinghouse, delivering its AP1000 on time and on budget in the United States is a challenge not yet accomplished, while newcomers like Aalo Atomics are turning to AI to speed design, permitting, and construction.

During speeches at the American Nuclear Society’s Winter Conference & Expo, happening this week in Washington, D.C., Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chair David Wright both promised that the Trump administration will speed up nuclear reviews so the U.S. can maintain leadership in nuclear energy.

The DOE’s Wright took a stab at the NRC’s traditionally slow bureaucratic processes in approving primarily large light water reactors in the past, saying that the agency needs to speed up to meet the greater demand for new small modular reactors.