Nuclear News

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has granted Pacific Gas & Electric a “timely renewal” exemption so the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant can continue operating while its license renewal application is under review, it was announced yesterday. This new decision clears a major regulatory hurdle to extending the operating license of the Units 1 and 2 beyond their original closure dates of 2024 and 2025, respectively.

The Department of Energy has announced the release of application guidance for the second award cycle of its $6 billion Civil Nuclear Credit (CNC) Program.

Part of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act—the $1.2 trillion bipartisan measure signed by President Biden in November 2021—the CNC Program was established to prevent the premature retirement of economically challenged nuclear power plants in recognition of the crucial role the Biden administration sees nuclear playing in achieving its ambitious decarbonization goals, including 100 percent clean electricity by 2035.

Walker

A bipartisan effort in the Illinois General Assembly to repeal the state’s decades-old prohibition on new nuclear plant construction made some progress this week when the House Public Utilities Committee voted 18–3 to advance a bill lifting the ban.

Introduced on January 12 by Rep. Mark Walker (D., 53rd Dist.)—who sponsored identical legislation last year—H.B. 1079 would delete language in the Illinois Public Utilities Act that prohibits nuclear plant construction in the state “until the director of the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency finds that the United States government, through its authorized agency, has identified and approved a demonstrable technology or means for the disposal of high-level nuclear waste, or until such construction has been specifically approved by a statute enacted by the General Assembly.” The bill has 31 cosponsors—four Democrats and 27 Republicans.

Lightbridge Corporation, which is continuing to work closely with national laboratories on the manufacture and testing of its metallic fuel rod designs for light water reactors, just announced the results of an investigation on the casting process for molten uranium and zirconium with Pacific Northwest National Laboratory under the Department of Energy’s Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear (GAIN) program.

Dow and X-energy announced today that they have signed a joint development agreement (JDA) to demonstrate the first grid-scale advanced nuclear reactor at an industrial site in North America within a decade. As part of the agreement, Dow is now a subawardee under X-energy’s Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program (ARDP) Cooperative Agreement with the Department of Energy.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has issued its final safety evaluation report (SER) related to the operating license application for SHINE Technologies' large-scale medical isotope production facility, known as The Chrysalis, in Janesville, Wis. The SER documents the results of NRC staff’s technical and safety review of SHINE’s application. SHINE announced the NRC’s decision on February 27.

A record of decision concerning the proposed issuance of the operating license will be published by the NRC at a future date.

Donalds

Rep. Byron Donalds (R., Fla.) recently introduced in the House a four-bill nuclear energy package that, according to the congressman’s office, seeks to “reshape the way our country uses and views nuclear energy.”

Included in the package are the following measures—all originally introduced in the 117th Congress:

• H.R. 1009—National Strategy to Utilize Microreactors for Natural Disaster Response Efforts Act. This legislation calls on the president to collaborate with several federal entities that currently enjoy minimal interaction to develop a national strategy for the use of microreactors to assist with natural disaster impacts. Cosponsors include Reps. Earl “Buddy” Carter (R., Ga.), Randy Feenstra (R., Iowa), Chuck Fleischmann (R., Tenn.), Doug Lamborn (R., Colo.), Nancy Mace (R., S.C.), Jay Obernolte (R., Calif.), and John Rose (R., Tenn.).

Westinghouse Electric Company has filed a notice of intent to submit key licensing reports for its eVinci microreactor to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission for joint review, the firm announced last week. (The two nuclear regulators signed a memorandum of cooperation in August 2019 to increase collaboration on the technical reviews of advanced reactor and small modular reactor technologies.)

Three up, one to go: The third of four Korean-designed APR-1400 reactors at the United Arab Emirates’ Barakah nuclear power plant has begun commercial operation, Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation (ENEC) announced on February 24.

Jasmina Vujic

Nuclear energy is uniquely poised to create reliable, carbon-free, domestically produced baseload electricity to meet our rising energy demands. It must be a central part of our energy mix in order to have sustainable development, competitiveness, and independence as global energy demand continues to grow. There is also a growing need to address national security challenges like nuclear proliferation resistance and nuclear threat reduction. The fastest and most efficient way to realize the full potential of nuclear power and address nuclear security challenges is to draw on the strengths of our universities, national laboratories, and industry.

U.S. universities are well equipped to be the preeminent providers of nuclear science and engineering education at the undergraduate, graduate, and postgraduate levels and to perform world-class research across all nuclear science and engineering disciplines, utilizing the resources available across the higher education network and through unique national laboratory partnerships.

The 1957 amendment to the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 established the Advisory Committee On Reactor Safeguards as a statutory committee with an independent advisory role and the responsibility to “review safety studies and facility license applications” and advise the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission “with regard to the hazards of proposed or existing reactor facilities and the adequacy of reactor safety standards.” With the enactment of the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974, the ACRS was assigned to the newly established Nuclear Regulatory Commission with its statutory requirements intact.

State-owned Polish utility Polskie Electrownie Jądrowe and U.S.-based Westinghouse on February 22 moved a step closer to their end goal—the deployment of multiple AP1000 reactors in Poland—with the signing of a contract covering front-end engineering, early procurement work, and program development.

The Finnish government on February 16 granted a new operating license to Fortum Power and Heat Oy for its two Loviisa reactors—twin 507-MWe VVER-440/V213 units—providing them with an additional 20 years of operational life.

Constellation Energy has announced that it intends to invest $800 million in new equipment at the Braidwood and Byron nuclear plants in Illinois to raise their combined output by a total of about 135 MW.

The Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy (ARPA-E) announced $10 million in funding on February 17 for eight projects designed to determine whether low-energy nuclear reactions (LENR)—historically and sometimes disparagingly known as “cold fusion”—could someday be a carbon-free energy source. ARPA-E intends the funding to “break the stalemate” and determine if LENR holds any merit for future energy research.

A fire broke out at the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tenn., earlier today. According to Y-12’s Facebook page, one of the site’s production buildings had a fire in a hood at approximately 9:15 a.m. Y-12 emergency services responded to the event and precautionary protective actions were initiated for employees who were in the vicinity of the incident and who were not involved in the emergency response.

The Tennessee Valley Authority took Browns Ferry-2 off line February 17 for a refueling and maintenance outage, following a nearly two-year, breaker-to-breaker run—the first in the Alabama nuclear plant’s history.

According to the utility, the unit established a new record for itself with 665 days of continuous operation, producing more than 20 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity.

The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) and Poland’s National Atomic Energy Agency (PAA) have signed a memorandum of cooperation to share best practices and experience in reviewing advanced and small modular reactor technologies. (The two agencies are already engaged in cooperation on nuclear safety matters under a memorandum of understanding inked in 2014.)

The bipartisan Nuclear Fuel Security Act (NFSA), introduced in the Senate last week, would authorize the Department of Energy to establish a Nuclear Fuel Security Program to “ensure a disruption in Russian uranium supply would not impact the development of advanced reactors or the operation of the United States’ light water reactor fleet.” The bill was introduced by Sen. Joe Manchin (D., W.V.), chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources (ENR) Committee; Sen. John Barrasso (R., Wyo.), ranking member of the Senate ENR committee; and Sen. Jim Risch (R., Idaho).

In March 1949, the Atomic Energy Commission selected a site in Idaho for the National Reactor Testing Station (NRTS), known today as Idaho National Laboratory. Idaho’s Snake River Plain was selected because of the rural nature of southern Idaho. The site would go on to be the most remarkable proving ground for today’s nuclear industry. Experiments at this world-class facility have continually paved the way for nuclear innovation.