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FINLAND’S STEADY ENERGY, a startup company spun out from the VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, and Nuclear Services (TVONS), a consulting company wholly owned by Finnish utility Teollisuuden Voima Oyj (TVO) are to collaborate on development of a nuclear plant using small modular reactors in Finland for the purpose of district heat generation.
THE NORWEGIAN MUNICIPALITY of Heim in Trøndelag county has begun regulatory work to establish a zone for the construction of a NPP and cancellation of previous plans for the zone. “The regulatory plan will lay the foundation for the establishment of nuclear power plants, preferably in the form of small modular reactors,” the Heim municipality said.
NORWAY’S NORSK KJERNEKRAFT has decided to initiate an impact assessment for a site in the municipality of Oygarden in Vestland County as the possible location for a NPP comprising up to five small modular reactors. The company will compile a report for the Ministry of Oil & Energy as the basis for consultation with the municipality, residents and industry. If approved by the ministry, the report and comments will be used to prepare an impact assessment.
US OKLO HAS signed a non-binding letter of intent (LOI) with oil and gas producer Diamondback Energy to enter into a 20-year power purchase agreement. The proposed agreement focuses on engaging Oklo’s planned Aurora microreactors to supply electricity to Diamondback’s operations in the Permian Basin.
HYDROGEN THE JAPANESE GOVERNMENT plans to start field testing clean hydrogen production using nuclear power by 2028 following successful safety tests of the High Temperature Engineering Test Reactor (HTTR). The test was carried out by the Japan Atomic Energy Agency as an international joint research project under the OECD/NEA.
TECHNOLOGY THE PRESIDENT OF the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran, Mohammad Eslami said Iran had unveiled 150 scientific and technological achievements in the nuclear industry in the previous Iranian calendar year. Among the achievements, 15 were registered in the radiopharmaceuticals field, He added that irradiation systems will be installed in 12 centres across the country to protect 130 tonnes of agriculture products.
China
Nuclear research facilities open up China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC) has opened 10 of its key nuclear technology research facilities and testing platforms to the world for the first time to encourage international cooperation. These include the new-generation Huanliu-3 (HL-3) tokamak; the world’s highest-energy compact proton cyclotron accelerator, the Beijing Radioactive Ion-beam Facility (BRIF); one of the world’s six major neutron sources, the China Advanced Research Reactor; the Beishan Underground Research Laboratory (URL); the Minjiang Test Reactor for medical isotope research; the Swimming Pool Reactor; a Miniature Neutron Source Reactor; a Thermal & Safety Hydraulics Test Reactor; a Seismic Simulator & other Qualification Facilities; and the Wind Tunnel Featured Nuclear Environment Simulation Facilities. The HL-3 tokamak, China’s largest and most
advanced tokamak, is designed to support the operation of ITER, under construction in France and the development of future fusion reactors. The Beishan URL in Northwest China’s Gansu Province, 560 metres underground, is used for the safe disposal of high-level radioactive waste. The BRIF, the only operational online isotope separation radioactive ion beam facility in Asia, can produce over 60 stable nuclear beams and 55 radioactive nuclear beams. “Developing countries may not have the
research conditions similar to China but are eager to utilise Chinese research facilities to train researchers and receive support for their research work,” Zhang Libo, Vice President of CNNC’s China Institute of Atomic Energy, told the Global Times. He emphasised the importance of international cooperation in nuclear science and technology for mutual benefit and scientific progress.
United Kingdom More UK funding for Xe-100 X-Energy UK Holdings, a wholly-owned subsidiary of US-based X-energy Reactor Company and Cavendish Nuclear, a wholly- owned subsidiary of Babcock International have been awarded funding from the UK Government’s Future Nuclear Enabling Fund (FNEF) to further the development of their plans to deploy Xe-100 advanced modular reactors (AMRs) in the UK. The government’s £3.34m ($4.23m) will be matched by X-energy for a total programme of £6.68m. The funds will be used to develop UK-specific deployment plans including an assessment of domestic manufacturing and supply chain opportunities, constructability, modularisation studies, and fuel management. The Xe-100 is a high-temperature gas-cooled
reactor with an output of 200 MWt or 80 MWe. It can be scaled into a four-pack 320 MWe power plant, fuelled by the company’s proprietary TRISO-X tri-structural isotropic particle fuel. The Xe-100 evolved from both the UK’s Dragon reactor at Winfrith in Dorset and the Pebble
12 | May 2024 |
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Bed Modular Reactor project in South Africa. X-energy was selected by the US Department of Energy (DOE) in 2020 to receive up to $1.2bn in matching funds under the Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program (ARDP) to develop, license, build, and demonstrate an operational advanced reactor and fuel fabrication facility by the end of the decade. X-Energy has since completed the reactor engineering and basic design and is developing a fuel fabrication facility in Oak Ridge in Tennessee. X-energy and Cavendish Nuclear are
proposing to develop a 12-reactor plant at Hartlepool, to be ready by the early 2030s. The companies plan to build a fleet of up to 40 Xe- 100 reactors in the UK. X-energy and Cavendish also announced a
partnership with the UK Kier Group to support constructability and supply chain analyses. The UK’s Sheffield Forgemasters and the Nuclear Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (NAMRC) are also supporting X-energy and Cavendish in completing the scope outlined in their FNEF proposal. The goal is for 80% of the value of the Xe-100 projects to flow to UK firms. The companies plan to engage with the UK nuclear regulators to evaluate approaches to licensing the Xe-100 AMR. The design is already progressing through initial regulatory assessments in Canada and the United States.
Republic of Korea Another record for KSTAR The Korea Superconducting Tokamak Advanced Research (KSTAR) at the Korea Institute of Fusion Energy (KFE) in Daejeon has broken its previous plasma operation record during its first plasma campaign after upgrading its divertors, (plasma facing components) to tungsten monoblocks. KFE said it had sustained the plasma with ion temperatures of 100m degrees Celsius for 48 seconds during the KSTAR plasma campaign run from December 2023 to February 2024. Additionally, it achieved the high confinement mode (H-mode) for over 100 seconds. KSTAR achieved its milestone of reaching 100m degree plasma in 2018 for the first time and it set a new record by sustaining plasma with an ion temperature of 100m degrees for 30 seconds in 2021. The latest achievement was based on improvements in the performance of the plasma heating systems and advancements in high-temperature plasma operation and control techniques. The plasma duration resulted in a new record in the field of ion temperatures beyond 100 degrees. KSTAR also successfully maintained H-mode
for a continuous duration of 102 seconds. H-mode is the baseline operation mode for sustaining a high-temperature, high-density plasma state. These improvements are mainly due to the
2023 upgrade of KSTAR’s divertors. Compared with the previous divertors based on carbon, the new divertors showed only 25% increase in surface temperature under similar heat loads. ■
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