First projects selected for INL reactor experiments
The five initial selections for end user experiments at Idaho National Laboratory’s Microreactor Application Research Validation and Evaluation (MARVEL) reactor include projects related to data centres, technology application in commercial and advanced reactors, and applications for nuclear-generated process heat.
MARVEL is a sodium-potassium-cooled microreactor being developed by the US Department of Energy (DOE). It will generate 85 kilowatts of thermal energy and up to 20 kilowatts of electricity. It is to be located at the Transient Reactor Test Facility at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL), and will serve as a nuclear test bed to demonstrate microreactor operations and end-use applications, providing a platform for the private sector to access to an operational microreactor to demonstrate innovative new use cases for the technology. The reactor will be connected to INL’s microgrid, and is expected to be operational by late 2027.
Podcast: Johan Svenningsson on Sweden’s ‘Nuclear 2.0’, and his World Nuclear Association role
Johan Svenningsson is Country Chairman and CEO of Uniper Sweden, as well as being vice chairman and chairman-elect of World Nuclear Association.
In this edition of the World Nuclear News Podcast Svenningsson talks about what has been an eventful few years for the nuclear energy sector in Sweden, and the current positive mood around ambitious plans for new nuclear – “it’s fantastic, we’re basically talking about nuclear 2.0 in Sweden”, is how he puts it.
He also covers: lessons on modular construction from his previous work in the oil and gas and the pharmaceuticals industries; life-extension work; decommissioning programmes; and how the construction of a deep geological repository is progressing.
Regulator approves safety case for French repository
Andra submitted its application for the planned Centre Industriel de Stockage Géologique (Cigéo) repository to the Ministry for Energy Transition in January 2023. In March 2023, the ministry asked the Autorité de Sûreté Nucléaire (ASN) to lead the technical appraisal of the application to verify that the project offers all the guarantees required to meet the applicable safety requirements.
Andra plans to construct the Cigéo repository – an underground system of disposal tunnels – in a natural layer of clay near Bure, to the east of Paris in the Meuse/Haute Marne area. The facility is to be financed by radioactive waste generators – EDF, Framatome and the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission – and managed by Andra. It will hold 83,000 cubic metres of long-lived high-level waste and intermediate-level waste. Subject to the issuance of the creation authorisation decree in late 2027/early 2028, the receipt of the first waste packages is currently planned for 2050.
First fuel produced for molten salt reactor experiment
Idaho National Laboratory has launched full-scale production of enriched fuel salt for the world’s first test of a molten chloride salt fast reactor – technology that could be deployed as soon as the 2030s for both terrestrial and maritime applications.
First fuel produced for molten salt reactor experiment
The Molten Chloride Reactor Experiment (MCRE) project – a public-private collaboration between Southern Company, TerraPower, CORE POWER, and the US Department of Energy (DOE) – is planned to be the first reactor experiment hosted at the Laboratory for Operation and Testing in the United States (LOTUS) test bed being built at the lab by the DOE’s National Reactor Innovation Center. It uses liquid salt as the fuel and the coolant, allowing for high operating temperatures to efficiently produce heat or electricity.
Bilibino’s units being shut down for decommissioning
The three operable units at the Bilibino Nuclear Power Plant in Chukotka, Russia, are all to be permanently shut down by the end of the year.
The first of the three 12 MWe EGP-6 light water graphite-moderated reactors to be taken offline was Bilibino Unit 2. Unit 3 is scheduled to be shut down on 11 December, with Unit 4 following on 22 December. The first unit was shut down in 2018 and its used nuclear fuel removed to a storage pool.
Bilibino Nuclear Power Plant, in Russia’s Arctic north east, has been operating for 50 years in the permafrost zone, with its reactors operating for a combined 190 reactor-years, generating 11.6 billion kWh of electricity.
Upgrading of third Russian uranium enrichment plant starts
The first new 9+ generation gas centrifuges have been launched at the Isotope Separation Plant at the Siberian Chemical Combine in Seversk, Rosatom’s fuel division TVEL has announced.
It becomes the third of Rosatom’s four uranium enrichment sites to introduce the newest generation of centrifuges, following upgrade projects launched in 2018 at the Urals Electrochemical Combine and the Electrochemical Plant in Siberia.
Commissioning of the new centrifuges at the Isotope Separation Plant is scheduled to be completed in 2027. The fourth facility to be upgraded will be the Angrask electrolysis Chemical Plant in the Irkutsk region, Rosatom said.
Turkey Planning 5,000 MW Of Nuclear Capacity From Small Modular Reactors
Tukey is planning to add 5,000 MW of capacity from small modular reactors as it aims to deliver 10-15% of its electricity from nuclear power by 2050, minister for energy and natural resources Alparslan Bayraktar said.
He said the 2050 target includes 12 large-scale reactors, including four already under construction at Akkuyu and an additional eight units at Sinop and and Igneada.
Akkuyu is on the Mediterranean coast on the southern province of Mersin, Sinop is on the Black Sea in northern Turkey and Igneada is in Thrace, also on the Black Sea, not far from the Bulgarian border.
Akkuyu will have four Russia-supplied VVER-1200 pressurised water reactor units. Unit 1 was originally expected to enter commercial operation by the end of 2025 with the remaining units coming online by 2028. Bayraktar said recently that the first unit at Akkuyu is scheduled to begin commercial operation next year.