Radiation workshop and reactor tour a big draw for educators

March 15, 2024, 12:00PMANS News

The American Nuclear Society has hosted workshops for teachers for years, but the latest Educator Workshop and Research Reactor Tour, which took place in November at the 2023 Winter Conference and Expo, was especially successful. ANS partnered with the University of Maryland for the event, which was part of the Society’s Powering Our Future initiative, sponsored by the Department of Energy.

The arrow is pointing up

March 13, 2024, 7:10AMNuclear NewsKen Petersen

Ken Petersen
president@ans.org

There have been significant changes in the outlook for the existing U.S. nuclear fleet in the last few years. In 2021, we were looking at the early closure of units and could not even think of license extension. Since then, the combination of the U.S. government recognizing the clean-air benefits of nuclear and the impact of the war in Ukraine has resulted in a lot of positive activity on Capitol Hill for nuclear.

Several pieces of legislation have been passed in support of nuclear as law- and policymakers have recognized the important role nuclear power can play in achieving the nation’s clean-air goals. New legislation also is supporting reducing reliance on Russia for uranium enrichment by supporting the domestic production of high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU).

The Civil Nuclear Credit (CNC) Program, which was part of the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, included $6 billion to prevent premature retirement of existing zero-carbon nuclear plants. On January 17, the Department of Energy awarded Diablo Canyon $1.1 billion from the CNC Program to support continued operations of the plant.

X-energy’s helium coolant and fuel handling test facility gets EA/FONSI

March 11, 2024, 12:00PMNuclear News
Concept art of the planned X-energy helium test facility. (Image: DOE OCED)

The Department of Energy’s Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations issued a final environmental assessment (EA) and finding of no significant impact in February for a cost-shared X-energy project to construct and operate a helium test facility (HTF) in Oak Ridge, Tenn. According to the EA, construction would begin in early 2024 and take X-energy and its contracted partner, Kinetrics, about one year to complete. the facility would then operate for six years, with the possibility of extensions for up to an additional 20 years, to test equipment for a demonstration of X-energy’s high-temperature, gas-cooled reactor technology and also to “serve the reactor community at large as the technology continues to develop and is adopted around the world.”

NWTRB recommends further analysis of SNF canisters

March 8, 2024, 12:04PMRadwaste Solutions

The Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board (NWTRB), the independent federal agency tasked with reviewing the Department of Energy’s activities related to spent nuclear fuel management, issued a new report to Congress and the secretary of energy that examines the storage of spent fuel in dry storage casks at independent spent fuel storage installations (ISFSI).

Engineering scholarship established by L&A at WSU Tri-Cities

March 4, 2024, 9:30AMNuclear News
The Washington State University Tri-Cities campus. (Photo: WSU)

A new engineering scholarship at Washington State University (WSU) Tri-Cities has been established by Longenecker & Associates for students interested in careers that support Department of Energy missions.

Commercial HALEU supply chain draft EIS now open for comment

March 1, 2024, 9:32AMNuclear News
HALEU reguli fabricated from downblended high-enriched uranium recovered from legacy EBR-II fuel at Idaho National Laboratory. (Image: DOE)

The Department of Energy yesterday announced a draft environmental impact statement (EIS) on HALEU Availability Program plans to purchase high-assay low-enriched uranium under 10-year contracts to seed the development of a sustainable commercial HALEU supply chain.

What is involved in radiation protection at accelerator facilities?

February 29, 2024, 3:03PMNuclear NewsIrina Popova

Irina Popova

Particle accelerators have evolved from exotic machines probing hadron interactions to understand the fundamentals of our world to widely used instruments in research and for medical and industrial use. For research purposes, high-power machines are employed, often producing secondary particle beams through primary beam interaction with a target material involving many meters of shielding. The charged beam interacts with the surrounding structures, producing both prompt radiation and secondary radiation from activated materials. After beam termination, some parts of the facility remain radioactive and potentially can become radiation hazards over time. Radiation protection for accelerator facilities involves a range of actions for operation within safe boundaries (an accelerator safety envelope). Each facility establishes fundamental safety principles, requirements, and measures to control radiation exposure to people and the release of radioactive material in the environment.

DOE eyes WIPP site for potential clean energy projects

February 29, 2024, 12:00PMRadwaste Solutions
The DOE's Waste Isolation Pilot Plant. (Photo: DOE)

The Department of Energy has issued a request for information (RFI) to identify industry partners interested in developing commercial clean energy projects at the DOE’s at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) site in southeast New Mexico.

Type One Energy wants to build a stellarator at retired coal plant

February 23, 2024, 6:59AMNuclear News
TVA's Bull Run fossil plant. (Photo: TVA)

Type One Energy Group announced plans on February 21 to relocate its headquarters from Madison, Wis., to the Tennessee Valley Authority’s (TVA) Bull Run fossil plant in Clinton, Tenn., where it will build a stellarator fusion prototype machine. According to the company, the construction of the stellarator—called Infinity One—could begin in 2025, if necessary environmental reviews, partnership agreements, permits, and operating licenses are all in hand.

NRC seeks comments on new fee schedule for FY 2024

February 22, 2024, 3:00PMNuclear News

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is asking for feedback on proposed changes to the annual, licensing, inspection, and special projects fees for fiscal year 2024.

The proposed fee rule, published February 20 in the Federal Register, is based on the FY 2024 Congressional Budget Justification as a full-year appropriation, but it has not yet been enacted. The final rule will be based on the NRC’s actual appropriation, and the agency will update the final fee schedule as appropriate.

Kairos Power, DOE agree on milestone approach to Hermes support

February 22, 2024, 9:30AMNuclear News

Kairos Power announced on February 21 that it has signed a technology investment agreement with the Department of Energy to implement the Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program (ARDP) Risk Reduction funding that the company was awarded in December 2020. Under the agreement, the DOE will provide up to $303 million to Kairos Power using a performance-based, fixed-price milestone approach to support the design, construction, and commissioning of the Hermes demonstration reactor in Oak Ridge, Tenn.

Can uranium extraction from seawater make nuclear power completely renewable?

February 20, 2024, 11:52AMNuclear NewsJames Conca
Researchers have been working frantically to develop an array of materials and fibers to economically extract uranium from seawater—and they have succeeded. PNNL scientists exposed this special uranium-sorbing fiber developed at ORNL to Pseudomonas fluorescens and used the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne National Laboratory to create a 3-D X-ray microtomograph to determine microstructure and the effects of interactions with organisms and seawater. (Image: PNNL)

America, Japan, and China are racing to be the first nation to make nuclear energy completely renewable. The hurdle is making it economical to extract uranium from seawater, because the amount of uranium in seawater is truly inexhaustible.

While America had been in the lead with technological breakthroughs from the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest and Oak Ridge National Laboratories, researchers at Northeast Normal University in China have sprung ahead. But these breakthroughs from both countries have brought the removal of uranium from seawater within economic reach. The only question is when will the source of uranium for our nuclear power plants change from mined ore to sea­water extraction?

Local high schoolers shadow SRS engineers

February 20, 2024, 9:27AMRadwaste Solutions
Aiken County Public School District students test out a mock glovebox during a tour of the Savannah River Site’s Waste Solidification Building. (Photo: SRNS)

Fifteen area high school students recently completed job shadow experiences with leaders, engineers, and education outreach personnel at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina, according to Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS).

Taking aim at disease

February 16, 2024, 3:02PMNuclear NewsKristi Nelson Bumpus
ORNL radioisotope manufacturing coordinator Jillene Sennon-Greene places a shipment vial of actinium-225 inside the dose calibrator to confirm its activity is within customer specifications. (Photo: Carlos Jones/ORNL, DOE)

On August 2, 1946, 1 millicurie of the isotope carbon-14 left Oak Ridge National Laboratory, bound for the Barnard Free Skin and Cancer Hospital in St. Louis, Mo.

That tiny amount of the radioisotope was purchased by the hospital for use in cancer studies. And it heralded a new peacetime mission for ORNL, built just a few years earlier for the production of plutonium from uranium for the Manhattan Project.

RIPB safety case for TerraPower’s MCRE

February 13, 2024, 7:00AMNuclear News

Last month at the American Nuclear Society’s Risk-informed, Performance-based Principles and Policy Committee’s (RP3C’s) Community of Practice (CoP), Brandon Chisholm presented “Development of a Risk-Informed and Performance-Based Safety Case for TerraPower’s Molten Chloride Reactor Experiment (MCRE).” RP3C holds a CoP on the last Friday of the month from 3:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. (ET), and participation is open to all professionals interested in RIPB principles and practices. Chisholm’s January 26 presentation is available to stream on YouTube.

MARVEL microreactor start-up now expected in 2027, as fuel fabrication begins

February 8, 2024, 12:00PMNuclear News
Concept art of the MARVEL microreactor (Image: INL)

The Department of Energy announced February 7 that fuel for the MARVEL microreactor, which Idaho National Laboratory plans to host inside the Transient Reactor Test (TREAT) facility, is now being fabricated by TRIGA International, with the first fuel delivery expected in spring 2025. MARVEL operation was expected “by the end of 2024” as recently as May 2023, but that timeline had shifted by October, when the DOE said MARVEL “is expected to be completed in early 2025.” Now, according to the DOE’s latest announcement, “Fuel loading for MARVEL is anticipated to occur in 2026, with the microreactor expected to be on line by 2027.”

Atoms for Humanity highlights nuclear’s clean energy and space exploration roles

February 8, 2024, 9:30AMNuclear News
Argonne director Paul Kearns delivers the plenary lecture on the first day of the 2023 Atoms for Humanity symposium. (Photo: Purdue NE/CHE)

The roles of nuclear energy as a clean energy source and in space exploration were highlighted at the recent Atoms for Humanity symposium, held October 25–26, 2023. The symposium, which was organized by Purdue’s Center for Intelligent Energy Systems (CiENS) and hosted by the university’s School of Nuclear Engineering, was held on the West Lafayette, Ind., campus in Eliza Fowler Hall.

Hanford’s initial tank waste campaign a success

February 7, 2024, 3:00PMRadwaste Solutions
A monitor in the control room of the Hanford Site’s TSCR system shows workers performing maintenance inside the TSCR facility. (Photo: DOE)

The Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management’s Office of River Protection and contractor Washington River Protection Solutions have completed the first waste processing campaign through the Tank-Side Cesium Removal (TSCR) system at the Hanford Site.

Zeno Power will repurpose legacy radioisotope source from ORNL

January 31, 2024, 12:03PMNuclear News

Zeno Power announced on January 26 that it will get the strontium-90 that it needs to fuel full-scale radioisotope power systems (RPSs) for national security and space exploration missions from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM). Under a public-private partnership, a large legacy RPS known as the BUP-500 that had languished, unused, in storage at Oak Ridge National Laboratory has been transported to an unnamed commercial radiological facility in Pennsylvania—Zeno Power’s subcontractor—where the Sr-90 it contains will be repurposed as heat sources for Zeno Power devices.