Kairos Power broke ground yesterday on a Salt Production Facility at the company’s newly dedicated Manufacturing Development Campus during an event at a sprawling site in Mesa del Sol, N.M., just south of Albuquerque. The new facility will produce the FLiBe (a mixture of lithium fluoride and beryllium fluoride salts) needed to cool the advanced reactors Kairos Power plans to build, starting with its Hermes nonpower demonstration reactor in Oak Ridge, Tenn., and could be operational and producing salt in 2026, according to an October 3 Department of Energy news release.

Kairos Power accomplished another step forward for its Hermes 2 reactor plans as the Nuclear Regulatory Commission this week published its final environmental assessment and finding of no significant impact.

Earlier today, on a site in Oak Ridge, Tenn., that was formerly home to the K-33 Gaseous Diffusion Plant, Kairos Power marked the start of construction on its low-power demonstration reactor. Named Hermes, the 35-MWt test reactor claims status as the first Gen IV reactor to be approved for construction by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the first non–light water reactor to be permitted in the United States in more than 50 years.

Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has completed its final safety evaluation for Kairos Power’s application to build its Hermes 2 molten salt–cooled reactor test facility in Oak Ridge, Tenn., the agency announced July 22. Earlier, and independently, the NRC’s Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS) reviewed safety-related aspects of the Kairos application and provided its review to the Commission on July 17. The evaluation concluded that there are no safety aspects that would preclude issuing a construction permit for the facility, but that can’t happen until the NRC staff issues its final environmental assessment later this summer and the Commission assesses the staff’s work (under newly streamlined procedures for mandatory hearings) this fall before voting on whether to authorize a construction permit.

Kairos Power announced on February 21 that it has signed a technology investment agreement with the Department of Energy to implement the Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program (ARDP) Risk Reduction funding that the company was awarded in December 2020. Under the agreement, the DOE will provide up to $303 million to Kairos Power using a performance-based, fixed-price milestone approach to support the design, construction, and commissioning of the Hermes demonstration reactor in Oak Ridge, Tenn.

Kairos Power has received the go-ahead from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to build its Hermes demonstration reactor at the Heritage Industrial Park in Oak Ridge, Tenn., making it the first non–light water reactor approved for construction in the United States in more than 50 years.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Statement from American Nuclear Society Executive Director and CEO Craig Piercy:

"Congratulations to Kairos Power from the American nuclear community on securing the first U.S. construction permit for a non-light water reactor in over 50 years. Kairos' regulatory milestone comes as COP28 climate negotiations go into overtime in Dubai. Kairos' achievement marks a pivotal step forward in scaling up advanced nuclear energy technologies required for a clean and resilient energy future. We look forward to the Hermes demonstration reactor breaking ground next year in East Tennessee."

The development of modern nuclear reactor technologies relies heavily on complex software codes and computer simulations to support the design, construction, and testing of physical hardware systems. These tools allow for rigorous testing of theory and thorough verification of design under various use or transient power scenarios.

A notice of opportunity from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission was published in the November 22 Federal Register to intervene in an adjudicatory hearing on Kairos Power’s application for a construction permit to build the Hermes 2 test reactor facility in Oak Ridge, Tenn.

In October, staff at Kairos Power’s testing and manufacturing facility in Albuquerque, N. M., began transferring 14 tons of molten fluoride salt coolant into an Engineering Test Unit (ETU)—the largest transfer of FLiBe (a mixture of lithium fluoride and beryllium fluoride) since the Molten Salt Reactor Experiment in 1969.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has completed its final environmental impact statement (FEIS) for Kairos Power’s application to build the Hermes demonstration reactor in Oak Ridge, Tenn., and is advising that the construction permit (CP) be issued.

“After weighing the environmental, economic, technical, and other benefits against environmental and other costs, and considering reasonable alternatives, the NRC staff recommends, unless safety issues mandate otherwise, that the NRC issue the CP to Kairos,” the FEIS states.

Kairos Power has filed a construction permit application with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a two-unit version of its Hermes advanced test reactor.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has completed its final safety evaluation for Kairos Power’s application to build its Hermes advanced test reactor at a site in Oak Ridge, Tenn., the agency announced recently. The evaluation found no safety aspects precluding issuance of a construction permit for the proposed reactor.

Having completed its review of the construction permit application for Kairos Power’s Hermes test reactor early last month, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS) recently submitted its conclusions to the agency, recommending approval.

Kairos Power, an Alameda, Calif.–based advanced reactor developer, announced yesterday that it has been named to Cleantech Group’s list of the 100 most innovative and promising private companies in the cleantech sector for 2023. Cleantech Group is a research and consulting services firm headquartered in San Francisco.

Kairos Power has signed an agreement to produce TRISO fuel pebbles for the Hermes demonstration reactor at Los Alamos National Laboratory's Low Enriched Fuel Fabrication Facility (LEFFF) in New Mexico. Hermes is being deployed in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The agreement was announced last week.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission issued a draft environmental impact statement (EIS) recently on Kairos Power’s application for a permit to construct Hermes, a 35-MW nonpower version of the company’s fluoride salt–cooled reactor design (KP-FHR), at the East Tennessee Technology Park in Oak Ridge, Tenn.

Laufer

Developing a first-­of-­a-­kind reactor is a daunting endeavor. To be successful, advanced reactor designers need to achieve cost certainty by delivering a safe and affordable product at the promised cost. To meet this goal, Kairos Power structured its approach around four key strategies: 1) achieving technology certainty through a rapid iterative approach; 2) achieving construction certainty by demonstrating the ability to build it; 3) achieving licensing certainty by proving Kairos can license it; and 4) achieving supply chain certainty by vertically integrating critical capabilities. By mitigating risk in these four key areas, Kairos Power is confident that it will get true cost certainty for our future products.

The third prong in Kairos’s strategy—achieving licensing certainty—was a key driver in the decision to build the Hermes low-­power demonstration reactor, and it remains a major workstream as the company’s construction permit application (CPA) undergoes review by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Licensing a new nuclear technology is no small challenge, and there are multiple approaches companies can take. Here’s a look at how we at Kairos are approaching it.

Kairos Power needs a source of high-purity fluoride salt to test its molten salt reactor design and ultimately to serve as the coolant in its grid-scale fluoride salt–cooled, high-temperature reactor (KP-FHR). As part of a cooperative development agreement with Materion Corporation, Kairos Power designed a molten salt purification plant (MSPP) that has just been commissioned at Materion’s campus in Elmore, Ohio.

Kairos Power announced today that it has assembled an advanced nuclear development advisory consortium with four North American nuclear operators—Bruce Power, Constellation, Southern Company, and the Tennessee Valley Authority—dubbed Kairos Power Operations, Manufacturing and Development Alliance (Kairos Power-OMADA).