Megawatt Microreactors at US Military Bases by 2025

The US Department of Defense (DOD) has awarded a $17.5 million contract option to X-energy develop an enhanced engineering design (second mobile reactor) for a transportable microreactor suitable for both commercial and defense use under the Project Pele initiative. X-energy has developed the Xe-Mobile – a power generation system that can be delivered to the …

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Helion Energy Partners With Nucor Steel for 500MW Nuclear Fusion Power Plant in 2030

Helion Energy, a nuclear fusion power company, and Nucor Corporation, the largest steel producer and recycler in North America, announced an agreement to develop a 500 MWe fusion power plant at a Nucor steel manufacturing facility in the United States. This collaboration is aimed at accelerating the future of clean energy in the industrial manufacturing …

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Scaling NIF Laser Fusion to 2030

This is a summary of the information from the Inertial Fusion Science and Applications 2023 conference and the presentations and announcements from Lawrence Livermore National Labs and the National Ignition facility. There is already an article with more details on the scaling plans. The July 30, 2023 result already improved already got 23% more power …

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LLNL NIF Plans for Higher Laser Power and a Roadmap to Over 10X Fusion Gain

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Lab (LLNL) made worldwide news when they reached nuclear fusion ignition in December 2022 but they went beyond that result on July 30, 2023. I am attending the 2023 International Conference on Inertial Fusion Sciences and Applications where there have been numerous presentations by leaders of …

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Copenhagen Atomics Progress to Mass Manufacturing Thorium Reactors and First Reactor in 2028

Copenhagen Atomics has raised over 25 million euros and has developed full scale reactor hardware for molten salt thorium nuclear reactors. Almost a decade ago Copenhagen Atomics was founded based on a dream dream of a world powered by scaleable and green energy more affordable than coal; a thorium molten salt breeder reactor. They are …

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X-Energy Small Modular Pebble Bed Reactor Gets More Customers and Funding

Energy Northwest, a premier provider of carbon-free electricity, and X-Energy Reactor Company (“X-energy”), a leading developer of advanced small modular nuclear (pebble bed fission) reactors and fuel have a joint development agreement for up to 12 Xe-100 advanced small modular reactors in central Washington capable of generating up to a total of 960 megawatts of …

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HB11 Energy Receives Grant from US Department of Energy for Laser Nuclear Fusion

The U.S. Department of Energy (DoE) has awarded a grant to HB11 Energy as part of its ‘Innovation Network for Fusion Energy’ (INFUSE) program with the objective, “to accelerate basic research to develop cost-effective, innovative fusion energy technologies in the private sector.” The program will provide access to world-leading expertise from the Laboratory for Laser …

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General Fusion Funded to Build Scientific Breakeven Fusion Machine by 2026

General Fusion announced a new Magnetized Target Fusion (MTF) machine that will fast-track the company’s technical progress. The planned fusion machines is to achieve fusion conditions of over 100 million degrees Celsius by 2025, and progress toward scientific breakeven by 2026. They completed the first close of its Series F raise for a combined $25 …

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Energy Future Including Room Temperature Superconductors

I, Brian Wang, spoke with Randy Kirk about the room temperature superconductor developments and the future of energyo srand electric cars and trucks. Randy asked me about Elon Musk comments about his predicted future shortages. “My prediction is that we will go from…an extreme silicon shortage today to…an electricity shortage in two years,” Musk said …

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2027 DARPA NASA DRACO Nuclear Thermal Rocket That is Up To Three Times Better Than Chemical Rockets

DARPA and NASA are advancing toward the goal of the world’s first in-orbit demonstration of a nuclear thermal rocket (NTR) engine via DRACO, the Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations. DARPA has finalized an agreement with Lockheed Martin for the company to begin work on the fabrication and design of the experimental NTR vehicle (X-NTRV) …

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