Interest in DOE’s Versatile Test Reactor Heats Up
The post Interest in DOE’s Versatile Test Reactor Heats Up appeared first on POWER Magazine.
GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy (GEH) and TerraPower are jointly pursuing an opportunity to design and build the U.S. Department of Energy’s Versatile Test Reactor (VTR), an experimental fast neutron nuclear reactor that could start up by 2026.
The companies on Jan. 21 announced they collaborated on a response to an expression of interest (EOI) issued by Battelle Energy Alliance (BEA) in November 2019, to gauge stakeholder interest in forming a cost-sharing partnership arrangement to design and and construct the VTR. BEA, which is the day-to-day contractor for Idaho National Laboratory (INL), where the reactor will be likely sited, said the scope of the partnership could include “development and deployment of the VTR, other uses of VTR capabilities beyond just advanced reactor design and licensing, reducing the cost and schedule risk of new nuclear plant design and construction, and other compatible uses of VTR capabilities.”
GEH and TerraPower will be backed by Energy Northwest, a utility that operates the Columbia nuclear reactor in Washington State and has the option to operate 12 NuScale small modular reactor (SMR) modules that are planned for construction at INL by Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS).…