The National Reactor Innovation Center is accepting applications from developers ready to take a fueled microreactor to criticality inside the former Experimental Breeder Reactor-II containment building at Idaho National Laboratory, now repurposed as DOME—a microreactor test bed. According to a Department of Energy announcement, DOME will be ready to receive the first experimental reactor in the fall of 2026, with testing likely to begin in 2027.

The Tennessee Valley Authority announced yesterday that it has submitted a construction permit application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for the construction of a GE Vernova Hitachi Nuclear Energy BWRX-300 small modular reactor at the Clinch River nuclear site in Oak Ridge, Tenn.

The recent surge in positive sentiment about nuclear as the most viable answer to global energy needs and decarbonization goals has found governments around the world taking steps to reverse course on decades-old bans, moratoriums, and restrictions on new nuclear development.

Urenco USA has initiated production of enriched uranium in its newest gas centrifuge enrichment cascade—the first in a planned expansion of its Eunice, N.M., facility announced in July 2023. When the expansion is complete, early in 2027, the site will have increased its capacity by about 15 percent, adding about 700,000 separative work units (SWU) per year, the company said May 19.

An initiative to educate government, regulatory, and industry representatives around the world about small modular reactors has been launched by the International Atomic Energy Agency, with the first such “SMR School” workshop, which was hosted by the government of Kenya in the capital city of Nairobi from on May 5–9.

As state legislatures nationwide near the end of their spring sessions, nuclear advocates hope to spur momentum on Texas legislation that would provide taxpayer-funded grants to developers of new nuclear technology in the state.

Craig Piercy
cpiercy@ans.org

This month’s issue of Nuclear News focuses on supply and demand. The “supply” part of the story highlights nuclear’s continued success in providing electricity to the grid more than 90 percent of the time, while the “demand” part explores the seemingly insatiable appetite of hyperscale data centers for steady, carbon-free energy.

Technically, we are in the second year of our AI epiphany, the collective realization that Big Tech’s energy demands are so large that they cannot be met without a historic build-out of new generation capacity. Yet the enormity of it all still seems hard to grasp.

or the better part of two decades, U.S. electricity demand has been flat. Sure, we’ve seen annual fluctuations that correlate with weather patterns and the overall domestic economic performance, but the gigawatt-hours of electricity America consumed in 2021 are almost identical to our 2007 numbers.

Santee Cooper is satisfied with the response generated by its initial request for proposals to buy what remains of the Summer-2 and -3 nuclear power plant project in South Carolina. The RFP was issued in January and the application window closed May 5.

The State of Texas has not one but two ongoing federal court challenges to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that could, if successful, turn decades of NRC regulations, precedent, and case law on its head.

Here’s a look at some recent announcements from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Summer SLR: The NRC this month published its final environmental impact statement for Summer Unit 1’s subsequent license renewal application. Dubbed a supplemental EIS, the report is an important step in determining if Dominion Energy can continue operating its 966-MWe Westinghouse pressurized water reactor unit for an additional 20 years beyond August 6, 2042, the current end of its license.