Southern Company and the US Department of Energy have established a cooperative agreement to design, build and operate a small reactor experiment that will advance TerraPower’s molten chloride fast reactor (MCFR) technology.

The company will lead the effort as part of a collaboration that includes TerraPower, Idaho National Laboratory, Core Power, Orano Federal Services, the Electric Power Research Institute and 3M Company.

TerraPower, founded by Bill Gates, said the MCFR technology operates at higher temperatures than conventional reactors, thus generating electricity more efficiently and without emissions.