DOE selects first companies for nuclear launch pad

The Department of Energy's Office of Nuclear Energy and the National Reactor Innovation Center have announced their first selections for the Nuclear Energy Launch Pad: three companies developing microreactors and one developing fuel supply.

The four companies-Deployable Energy, General Matter, NuCube Energy, and Radiant Industries-were selected from the initial pool of Reactor Pilot Program and Fuel Line Pilot Program applicants, the two precursor programs to the launch pad.

"Nuclear Energy Launch Pad builds on the foundation of DOE's pilot programs to open new doors for developers-broadening the scope beyond reactor and fuel technologies to welcome a wider range of nuclear technologies and applications, and creating more pathways, more flexibility and more opportunities to move promising technologies to deployment," said NRIC Director Brad Tomer.

According to the DOE, inclusion in the program allows these companies to begin discussion with NRIC on the enhanced technical, regulatory, and deployment support that the Nuclear Energy Launch Pad can provide.

The selections: Below are the companies who were selected for the Nuclear Energy Launch Pad.

• Deployable Energy: Headquartered in Houston, Texas, Deployable Energy is working on a 1-MWe gas-cooled microreactor designed for transportability and remote deployment, which the company says could be deployed in variety of use cases, including data centers, maritime, and defense.
• General Matter: The only fuel-focused company of the four on the list, California-based General Matter is aiming to improve the domestic fuel supply chain. Last year, it was reported to have leased a 100-acre parcel of federal land at the former Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Kentucky for a new private-sector domestic uranium enrichment facility, and in February, the DOE announced that the company had signed a lease to explore potential use of the long-idle Fuels and Materials Examination Facility at the Hanford Site in Washington state.
• NuCube Energy and Idaho State University: NuCube is developing a 15-MW high-temperature, solid-state microreactor. The Idaho Falls-based company is also a recent recipient of a DOE Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear (GAIN) voucher for verifying the autonomous operation and remote monitoring systems.
• Radiant Industries: Radiant, which is headquartered in California, is in the process of developing its TRISO-fueled, high-temperature, helium-cooled Kaleidos microreactor, which is slated for the inaugural fueled experiment at Idaho National Laboratory's recently opened Demonstration of Microreactor Experiments (DOME) test bed.