The US Department of Energy is planning to build a microreactor to help researchers and end-users understand how microreactors can integrate with other technologies. The Microreactor Applications Research Validation and EvaLuation liquid-metal cooled microreactor could be operational within three years.

A study into the feasibility of the development and deployment of small modular reactors in Canada, prepared at the request of the leaders of New Brunswick, Ontario and Saskatchewan, has concluded the development of SMRs would support domestic energy needs, curb greenhouse gas emissions and position Canada as a global leader in this emerging technology. The province of Alberta has joined the three provinces as a signatory to a Memorandum of Understanding to collaborate on SMR development.

Canadian Nuclear Laboratories has fabricated proprietary advanced fuel pellets for Ultra Safe Nuclear Corporation's Micro Modular Reactor. This is the first time that a TRISO-based nuclear fuel has been manufactured in Canada.

The Volgodonsk branch of Russia's AEM-Technology JSC has dispatched the first-ever reactor pressure vessel for the VVER-TOI (typical optimised, with enhanced information) reactor design. The RPV is being transported to the construction site of the Kursk II nuclear power plant, which will be the first to use the new design. Hydraulic testing of the RPV for the first Kursk II unit was completed in December last year.

Ontario Power Generation's Centre for Canadian Nuclear Sustainability and Moltex Energy are to collaborate on a project to demonstrate the technical viability of recycling used fuel from Candu reactors. OPG is providing CAD1 million (USD800,000) in funding for the project.

Framatome is to supply PROtect enhanced accident tolerant fuel technology and ATRIUM 11 fuel for the Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant in Monticello, Minnesota under a contract signed with Xcel Energy. This will be the first delivery of prototype EATF rods under the PROtect programme to a boiling water reactor, Framatome says.
 

The US Department of Defense's project to develop a mobile reactor - Project Pele - is on track for full power testing of a mobile reactor in 2023, with outdoor mobile testing at a Department of Energy installation in 2024, DOD's Jeff Waksman told the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission's 33rd Regulatory Information Conference last week.

The Research Institute of Atomic Reactors in Dimitrovgrad, in the Ulyanovsk region of Russia, has completed the second cycle of irradiation of the experimental fuel assemblies with VVER and pressurised water reactor fuel rods in the MIR research reactor. This marks the latest milestone in the development of Russian accident tolerant fuel, state nuclear corporation Rosatom announced today.

The nuclear energy industry will continue to innovate and adopt advanced technologies to constantly improve the way nuclear power plants generate efficient, reliable and carbon-free electricity to power an increasingly interconnected world, writes Catherine Cornand, senior executive vice president of the Installed Base Business Unit at Framatome.

Elemash Machine-building plant has launched a production site for the fabrication of fuel for China's flagship fast neutron reactor, the CFR-600. A subsidiary of Russian nuclear fuel manufacturer TVEL, Moscow-based Elemash has modernised an entire shop floor for fast reactors, and says 'dummy' fuel bundles for the CFR-600 are already being manufactured for testing.

The Bochvar Institute has developed a fuel rod design based on nitride uranium-plutonium fuel for the BREST-OD-300 fast neutron reactor. At the same time, Rosatom’s nuclear fuel division is developing second-generation fuel rods for the BREST-OD-300 with a higher burnout level, which will be used when MNUP fabrication will shift to the re-fabrication stage. This means that irradiated fuel of the first load after irradiation and reprocessing will be used for fresh fuel fabrication. Meanwhile, Rosatom has launched a tender to study the pyrochemical processing of used nuclear fuel from fast neutron reactors.

Unit 4 of the Beloyarsk nuclear power plant, Russia's BN-800 reactor, has been connected to the grid and resumed operations upon completion of scheduled maintenance. For the first time the refuelling has been carried out with uranium-plutonium fuel only.