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LLNL, Ampera partner to develop thorium-based TRISO fuel
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has formed a strategic partnership with Ampera to develop the company’s nuclear fuel concept through a project named THUNDER, for Thorium Unimodal Droplet Ejection for Reactors.
The focus of THUNDER is fabricating TRISO made with kernels of thorium rather than the usual uranium. LLNL and Ampera will evaluate and optimize liquid metal–jetting technology to produce highly uniform, spherical kernels of thorium-232 for later processing into TRISO fuel.
Steven Oleson (NASA Glenn Research Center), Elizabeth Turnbull (NASA Glenn Research Center), Laura Burke (NASA Glenn Research Center), Thomas Packard (HX5), Lee Mason (NASA Glenn Research Center), James Fittje (Science Applications International Corp.), Anthony Colozza (HX5), Paul Schmitz (Power Computing Solutions), Steven McCarty (NASA Glenn Research Center), John Yim (NASA Glenn Research Center), Brandon Klefman (NASA Glenn Research Center), John Gyekenyesi (HX5), Brent Faller (NASA Glenn Research Center), David Smith (HX5), Lucia Tian (NASA Glenn Research Center), Caroline Austin (NASA Glenn Research Center), W. Peter Simon (NASA Glenn Research Center), Christopher Heldman (NASA Glenn Research Center), Onoufrios Theofylaktos (NASA Glenn Research Center), Christine Schmid (NASA Glenn Research Center), Thomas Parkey (NASA Glenn Research Center), Natalie Weckesser (NASA Glenn Research Center)
Proceedings | Nuclear and Emerging Technologies for Space (NETS-2022) | Cleveland, OH, May 8-12, 2022 | Pages 240-248