Exelon Generation is preparing to refuel its Byron and Dresden nuclear plants after the Illinois Senate passed a comprehensive energy package that, amongst other things, will create a process for the state to procure carbon mitigation credits from nuclear plants as the state aims to reach net zero emissions by 2050. The Byron plant had been scheduled to permanently shut down from today had the bill not been passed.

The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission has issued a licence to Interim Storage Partners LLC to construct and operate a consolidated interim storage facility for used nuclear fuel in Andrews, Texas. Interim Storage Partners is a joint venture of Waste Control Specialists LLC and Orano USA.

The private sector must be prepared to provide the funds needed to take new and innovative reactor technologies from the first deployment stage to wide-scale commercial operation, Jigar Shah, director of the Loans Program Office at the US Department of Energy, said yesterday during World Nuclear Association's Annual Symposium. He said the LPO is developing the business models needed to deploy new nuclear.

Consideration of small modular reactors for the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico is advancing to the second stage. Having concluded such a deployment was feasible, the Nuclear Alternative Project is now looking at siting requirements. Speaking at World Nuclear Association's Annual Symposium yesterday, Eddie Guerra of NAP said the results of a study currently underway "will help to move the discussion how the sites will fit and how they will align with the minigrids already planned."

The former Centrifuge Complex site at Oak Ridge in Tennessee is now ready for industrial development. The complex was one of the final collections of buildings to be demolished last year as workers completed the first-ever cleanup of a former uranium enrichment complex. The footprint of the former facility is earmarked for the construction of a proposed regional airport at the East Tennessee Technology Park.

Uranium development company enCore Energy and integrated uranium exploration and development company Azarga Uranium Corp have announced plans to combine to create a 'top-tier' US in-situ leach uranium mining company with multiple assets at various stages of development.

Completion of unit 4 of the Khmelnitsky nuclear power plant in Ukraine will be accelerated by the use of major plant components in storage since the construction of new reactors at VC Summer in the USA was cancelled. The head of Energoatom toured Westinghouse warehouses to inspect the condition of the AP1000 components.

The US Department of Energy and Norway’s Ministry of Trade, Industry and Fisheries have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to advance a cooperative project to eliminate all of Norway’s highly enriched uranium by downblending it to low-enriched uranium. The MoU calls for downblending activities to begin in 2022 using Norway's existing infrastructure, followed by the eventual deployment of the DOE's Mobile Melt-Consolidate system.

Both demonstration and test reactors are necessary to support the development and commercial deployment of the new reactor technologies that will expand access to reliable, clean energy, writes Kathryn Huff, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy at the US Department of Energy. This article was first published by the Office of Nuclear Energy on 30 July.

Energoatom of Ukraine will explore the possible deployment of NuScale small modular reactors to replace fossil fuel plants, according to a Memorandum of Understanding signed by the companies. It is the latest in a series of agreements on energy signed during the visit of a Ukrainian delegation to the USA.

Doosan Heavy Industries & Construction has signed an engineering service contract with X-energy of the USA for studies into the manufacture of major components for the Xe-100 small modular reactor. The South Korean company said participating in the project will help it to diversify its own SMR business.

The European Space Agency has awarded a contract to Belgian company Tractebel to evaluate the possibility of producing plutonium-238 for use in space exploration. Separately, US company X-energy, working as part of a General Atomics Electromagnetic Systems team, is to develop key fuel fabrication processes in support of a first-of-a-kind rocket powered by nuclear thermal propulsion under a contract awarded by the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.