Here’s an easy way to make aging U.S. power reactors look relatively youthful: Compare them (average age: 43) with the nation’s university research reactors. The 25 operating today have been licensed for an average of about 58 years.
Nearly 300 public school teachers, career counselors, and school administrators from 11 middle and high schools in the Oak Ridge region of Tennessee recently attended a nuclear opportunities workshop. The event was held to provide information about careers available for students in the years ahead related to the cleanup mission of the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management.
Hash Hashemian
president@ans.org
The 2025 ANS Annual Conference in Chicago was a powerful springboard to begin my term as president. With over 1,400 attendees, it was one of our most dynamic gatherings in recent memory—full of energy, ideas, and a shared commitment to advancing nuclear science and technology.
As we move forward, my focus is clear: to elevate the role of nuclear in environmental protection, national security, energy diversity, and grid stability. These priorities are not just strategic—they are essential to a cleaner, more resilient future.
The goals I laid out at the conclusion of the Board of Directors meeting in June are simple, but I am sure they will be effective in engaging our community.
One simple change to start is the move away from the term meetings—the American Nuclear Society now uses the term conferences to describe its two yearly flagship gatherings, to more appropriately reflect the more than 1,000 attendees that these events bring together.
With this year’s awards already presented at the American Nuclear Society Annual Conference in June, the ANS Honors and Awards (H&A) Committee has set its sights on planning for next year’s distinctions. To that end, the H&A Committee is now soliciting suggested topics for the 2026 Special Award.
Colorado’s first nuclear power plant of the 21st century could be built at an unconventional site: the Denver International Airport (DEN).
In its mission to gain energy independence and become the greenest airport in the world, DEN has announced that it will conduct a feasibility study to determine the viability of building a small modular reactor on its 33,500-acre campus.
The International Atomic Energy Agency has completed an advisory service mission to Zambia focused on assessing the country's nuclear security regime for nuclear and other radioactive material out of regulatory control (MORC). The IAEA team recognized Zambia’s commitment to nuclear security because of its efforts to prevent, detect, and respond to unauthorized acts involving MORC, and pointed out capacity building and coordination among stakeholders as areas for further enhancement.
Craig Piercy
cpiercy@ans.org
For the past few years, I have been conducting a thoroughly unscientific, one-question poll of nuclear utility and supplier CEOs and senior executives: “What keeps you up at night?” The number one answer is—and has been from the beginning—“Workforce.”
The ongoing shortage of skilled labor—welders, pipefitters, electricians, and the like—almost always gets top billing in nuclear workforce discussions. In April 2025, the U.S. had an eye-popping 600,000 unfilled positions in the construction and manufacturing sectors. This consistent supply gap feeds a continuing talent war that has pushed craft wages up 20 percent since the end of the COVID pandemic, straining project budgets and profit margins alike.
Perhaps the most underappreciated gap in the nuclear workforce is professional and business services. It is the second-largest employment category in the nuclear industry, according to the Department of Energy’s 2024 U.S. Energy & Employment Report.
Uranium provider Cameco has calculated an end-of-July spot price for uranium of $71.10—a decline from the $78.50 of the previous month. Cameco lists a long-term price of $81.00 for July, which is the same price that was listed in January. From February to June, the long-term price was $80.00.
Uranium futures were about $71.45 per pound on August 4, according to online analysis firm Trading Economics, which noted that continued prices near $71.50 are maintaining the price drop from the seven-month high of $79.00 in mid-June. The relatively low prices are related to a lack of buying from holding funds, which have received lowered bids from utilities. Nevertheless, uranium prices are higher at this point, compared with the $63.70 price in mid-March this year.
Nieh
President Trump recently nominated Ho Nieh for the role of commissioner at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission through the remainder of a term that will expire June 30, 2029.
Nieh has been the vice president of regulatory affairs at Southern Nuclear since 2021, though he is currently working as a loaned executive at the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations, where he has been for more than a year.
Nieh’s experience: Nieh started his career at the Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory, where he worked primarily as a nuclear plant engineer and contributed as a civilian instructor in the U.S. Navy’s Nuclear Power Program.
From there, he joined the NRC in 1997 as a project engineer. In more than 19 years of service at the organization, he served in a variety of key leadership roles, including division director of Reactor Projects, division director of Inspection and Regional Support, and director of the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation.
The Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management announced it has signed a lease with General Matter for the reuse of a 100-acre parcel of federal land at the former Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Kentucky for a new private-sector domestic uranium enrichment facility.
Thorcon International has received official approval from BAPETEN, Indonesia’s nuclear regulator, for a site evaluation plan and site evaluation management system plan for the country’s Kelasa location. According to Thorcon, it is the first-ever nuclear power plant–related licensing approval from the Indonesian government, and it marks the completion of the first step of the company’s nuclear power plant licensing campaign in the country.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has sent a confirmatory order to Constellation Energy Generation outlining the agreed-on actions to address apparent violations of agency requirements at Quad Cities nuclear power plant in Cordova, Ill. The corrective and preventive actions are based on a June neutral party–mediated alternative dispute resolution (ADR) session that had been requested by Constellation to help it and the agency decide on steps forward.
The news is abuzz with recent stories about four radioactive wasp nests found at the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina. The site has been undergoing cleanup operations since the 1990s related to the production of plutonium and tritium for defense purposes during the Cold War. Cleanup activities are expected to continue into the 2060s.
Kasper
Hayes
The American Nuclear Society has officially selected two of its members to serve as its 2026 Glenn T. Seaborg Congressional Science and Engineering Fellows. Alyssa Hayes and Benjamin Kasper will help the Society fulfill its strategic goal of enhancing nuclear policy by working in the halls of Congress, either in a congressional member’s personal office or with a committee, starting next January.
“The Congressional Fellowship program has put ANS in a unique position to provide significant technical assistance to Congress on nuclear science, energy, and technology, with great results,” said Congressional Fellowship Special Committee chair Harsh Desai, himself a former Congressional Fellow. “This once-in-a-lifetime professional development opportunity will allow them to learn the art of policymaking and potentially pursue it as part of their careers beyond the fellowship.”
The Chicago suburb of Oak Brook, Ill., will be the home of Nano Nuclear Energy’s regional demonstration and office facility to support development of the company’s Kronos micro modular reactor (MMR). The company recently purchased for $3.5 million a 2.75-acre parcel that includes land and a 23,537-square-foot standalone building with a 7,400-square-foot nonnuclear demonstration area.
One of the more pivotal issues in facilitating the use of radiation sources—including nuclear power—in the United States (and most of the Western world) is concern about the health effects of low levels of radiation. The current regulatory assumption is that every additional increment of radiation linearly increases the risk of cancer.
Energy Secretary Chris Wright will attend the opening of the Advanced Manufacturing Collaborative in Aiken, S.C., on August 7. Wright will deliver remarks and join Savannah River National Laboratory leadership and partners for a ribbon-cutting ceremony.
The dust has settled: It’s been one month since President Trump signed H.R.1, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, after a lengthy and contentious reconciliation process. As drafts of the bill evolved through committees, the House, and the Senate, the fate of federal support for nuclear energy projects was often obfuscated.
Christensen
Woosley
Mike Woosley and Jacob Christensen, the 2025 recipients of the American Nuclear Society’s Glenn T. Seaborg Congressional Science and Engineering Fellowship, are now more than halfway through their stints on the Hill. Their fellowships will draw to a close in December.
To update the Society on what they have accomplished in Washington, D.C., so far, Woosley and Christensen recently gave Nuclear News a midterm update on which offices they ended up in and what they hope to do with their remaining time in the Capitol.
Fabrication of the reactor core for the 1.5-MW Project Pele demonstration microreactor has begun, according to BWX Technologies. Pele is being developed at the BWXT Innovation Campus in Lynchburg, Va., for the U.S. Department of Defense’s Strategic Capabilities Office.