There’s a growing interest in advanced nuclear energy.
Private
companies have already invested more than $1 billion in new reactor
designs that will be smaller, more affordable, highly flexible and
extremely safe. So safe, in fact, that in the event of a problem, human
intervention is not necessary.
More than 40 U.S. companies are
already working on these incredible reactor designs that could help
power our homes, provide clean water, and decarbonize energy-intensive
industries.
There’s just one problem…
The United States
doesn’t have a facility to effectively test and qualify the materials
needed to develop some of these advanced reactors.
That’s why it is imperative that the
U.S. Department of Energy moves forward with its plans to build a versatile test reactor, or VTR.
What is a versatile test reactor?
VTR, tightly coupled with the rest of our
research infrastructure, will be the state-of-the-art science and technology lab for advanced nuclear energy.
It
will feature a sodium-cooled fast reactor that uses high energy
neutrons to test and develop advanced reactor fuels and materials.
Fast
reactors use fast-moving neutrons to operate at higher temperatures and
lower pressures. They can be cooled by molten salt, liquid metal, or
helium gas.
This leads to inherent safety features, higher operating efficiencies and less waste.
Why do we need VTR?
Many of the advanced reactor designs that will likely produce power in the future will be fast reactors.
Because these designs use high energy neutrons, they interact differently with the materials they come in contact with.
Unfortunately, U.S. developers are limited in the amount of data they can use to properly characterize these materials.
That’s because America hasn’t operated a fast test reactor in more than two decades.
VTR
eliminates this research gap and would drastically speed up the time it
takes to test, develop and qualify advanced reactor technologies.
It
would also be pivotal in creating new fuels, materials, instrumentation
and sensors that could position the U.S. as a global leader in advanced
nuclear technology.
These innovations could drastically extend lifetime reactor cores, boost fuel performance and even accelerate fusion research.
Putting America first
Advanced nuclear will be developed with or without the United States.
If
we don’t build this capability, U.S. companies will have no choice but
to rely on foreign countries like Russia and China to develop their
technologies.
This would be a missed opportunity for our nation to
modernize its nuclear research infrastructure and export new
technologies that could re-energize the nuclear industry.
Regaining
global leadership in this emerging technology space is also essential
in protecting our interests, along with our allies, when it comes to
nuclear safety, security and non-proliferation.
What’s next?
DOE
will now move forward with its conceptual design of the reactor, which
could be completed as early as 2026 at the site of one our national
labs.
