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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.
Carmen Varlam, Irina Vagner, Ionut Făurescu, Anisia Bornea, Denisa Făurescu, Diana Bogdan
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 80 | Number 3 | April-May 2024 | Pages 391-398
Research Article | doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2023.2230413
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The electrolysis process is essential in the water detritiation subsystem using the combined electrolytic catalytic exchange process. A special experimental program was designed to characterize a modified HOGEN H Series industrial electrolyzer. The tritium amount transferred to hydrogen gas, the water enrichment factor, and the number of hours necessary to attain a steady-state regime were parameters of primary interest in the experiments. To minimize the necessary time for a steady-state regime, the holdup of the water electrolyzer was chosen as the minimum value allowed for safe and constant parameter operation in all experiments. The stationary regime was attained after 120 h, with an enrichment factor near 5, and an amount of 18% to 19% of tritium transferred from tritium-enriched water to hydrogen gas. These parameters were obtained in all three experiments, and the modeling software of isotope separation by electrolysis confirmed the results.