Centrus Energy got approval in June from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to operate a 16-machine cascade at DOE’s Portsmouth Site in Piketon, Ohio, that is intended to take uranium to the upper bounds of low-enrichment.
Centrus can operate the cascade until May 31, 2022, under the license amendment the commission approved June 11. The Bethesda, Md.-based company is building the cascade at the site of the now-decommissioned American Centrifuge Project as part of an 80-20 cost-share deal DOE awarded in 2020.
Centrus’ AC100M centrifuges will create high-assay, low-enriched uranium (HALEU) with 19.75% uranium-235 by mass. The material could be made into fuel for advanced reactor pilot projects at DOE.
The company is also tuning up its AC100 technology for possible use by the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), which needs a domestic source to enrich uranium for nuclear-weapons and defense programs in the second half of this century.
Under its $115-million deal with DOE, which had two years of firm funding and a one-year option, Centrus was to start operating the new cascade by March 1, 2022, provide a HALEU sample to DOE by March 15, 2022 and produce at least 200 kilograms of HALEU by June 1, 2022.
