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Antares achieves zero-power criticality at INL
Leveraging more than $140 million in private capital fundraising, over 322,000 square feet of operational manufacturing space, and multifaceted partnerships with the Departments of Energy and Defense, reactor start-up Antares has become the first company involved in the Reactor Pilot Program to achieve zero-power fueled criticality—a full month ahead of the July 4 deadline set by President Trump’s Executive Order 14301.
This milestone, announced yesterday, was achieved with the company’s Mark-0: a sodium heat-pipe-cooled, TRISO-fueled microreactor. The Mark-0 is a forerunner to the company’s flagship design, which it calls the R1. For Antares, this development represents a key validation of its reactor physics, control systems, and supply chain.
Suhas Bhandarkar, Ted Baumann, Noel Alfonso, Cliff Thomas, Kevin Baker, Alastair Moore, Cindy Larson, Don Bennett, John Sain, Abbas Nikroo
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 73 | Number 2 | March 2018 | Pages 194-209
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2017.1406248
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Low-density foam liners are seen as a means to mitigate hohlraum wall motion that can interfere with the inner set of beams that are pointed toward the middle section of the hohlraum. These liners need to meet several requirements, most notably the material choice and the maximum allowable solid fraction and thickness, which necessitate development of new processing capabilities. Here, we discuss our strategy and work on fabrication of a tantalum oxide foam liner and its assembly into targets for the National Ignition Facility (NIF). In particular, we discuss our approach to finding solutions to the unique challenges that come up in working with such low-density materials so as to be able establish a viable platform for production of cryogenic targets for NIF with foam-lined hohlraums.