Generation IV reactor will use molten salt technology on ‘power barges’, but company joins Bill Gates’ TerraPower in fuel supply warning
Danish nuclear startup Seaborg Technologies has confirmed an earlier decision to change the fuel and moderator technology for its Generation IV compact molten salt reactor (CMSR) – a move sparked by potential shortages of high-assay-low-enriched uranium (Haleu).
The company said the CMSR will now be designed to use a low-enriched uranium (LEU) fuel instead of Haleu.
The moderator for the reactor will need to be changed from sodium hydroxide to graphite, the company said.
Seaborg said the risks associated with developing a sufficient supply of Haleu motivated the move to change the fuel type for the CMSR.
Haleu is an essential advanced nuclear fuel required for the development of most next-generation reactor designs. Russia is the major Haleu supplier globally, and Chinese vendors are also capable of producing the material.
In a CMSR reactor, the fuel is mixed with molten fluoride salt, which also acts as a coolant. According to Seaborg, this provides significant safety benefits, the company has said previously.
The company intends to mount its innovative reactor on what it describes as “power barges”.
Seaborg said last year it was aiming to produce commercial prototypes of its reactor by 2024 with serial production in 2026.
The first power barges will have two reactors installed delivering 200 MW. The modular design allows for up to 800 MW over a 24-year lifetime, the company has said.
Bill Gates Company Also Warns On Haleu
Last month, Seaborg singed and agreement with Kepco Nuclear Fuel and GS Engineering & Construction to explore the development of a Leu fuel salt production facility in South Korea.
In April, Seaborg, Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power and shipbuilder Samsung Heavy Industries announced a consortium to develop floating nuclear power plants using the CMSR technology.
TerraPower, an advanced reactor company set up by Bill Gates, said last year that plans to deploy its Natrium sodium-cooled nuclear reactor in Wyoming by 2028 are facing delays because its only source of fuel was uranium from Russia, now at war with Ukraine.
TerraPower said Russia is the only commercial source of the more highly enriched fuel high-assay, low-enriched uranium (Haleu) fuel the Natrium nuclear power plant requires, but sourcing from there is no longer an option.
TerraPower will have to wait for the US supply chain to catch up and the chances that can happen by the company’s 2028 deployment target look slim.
US-based Centrus Energy plans to begin demonstrating first-of-a-kind production Haleu at a facility in Piketon, Ohio, by the end of 2023.
