Happy Friday, nuke-watchers. Here are some other stories RadWaste Monitor was tracking this week across the civilian nuclear power space.
DOE announces $5M grant for nuclear scholarships, university programs
The Department of Energy unveiled this week a package of federal cash aimed at propping up the nuclear industry’s next generation, according to a press release.
As part of the Office of Nuclear Energy’s University Nuclear Leadership Program (UNLP), DOE is providing around $5 million in scholarships and fellowships “for students across the country pursuing degrees in nuclear energy and engineering,” the agency said in a press release dated Tuesday. The awards consisted of 61 undergraduate scholarships and 28 graduate fellowships, the agency said, and are scheduled to be finalized by July 31.
UNLP awards around $5,000 per year to two-year institutions with nuclear-related programs, and around $10,000 per year to four-year institutions. Graduate fellows funded by UNLP receive around $52,000 annually over a three-year period. Fellows can also get $5,000 for an internship at one of DOE’s national laboratories or a similar research institution.
SNC-Lavalin, Moltex team up to tackle SMRs in Canada
A partnership announced this week between an SNC-Lavalin subsidiary and nuclear reactor manufacturer Moltex Energy is aimed at pushing forward the deployment of advanced nuclear power in Canada, according to a press release.
Candu Energy, part of Montreal-based SNC-Lavalin, has joined forces with Moltex to develop small modular reactor (SMR) technology in Canada, “including efforts to license and construct a first of a kind waste burning SMR in the province of New Brunswick,” the company said in a press release dated Wednesday.
“Moltex will draw on SNC-Lavalin’s world-class network of experts in engineering, licensing and regulatory affairs, cost estimating, supplier qualification and management, quality assurance, and construction and operation planning,” the release said.
Moltex is developing an advanced reactor that it says would be fueled by recycled nuclear waste. It is also developing reprocessing technologies for such a purpose.
SNC-Lavalin’s announcement comes after it was booted from another partnership with U.S.-based company Holtec International. Holtec in January terminated Comprehensive Decommissioning International (CDI), its four-year-old joint venture with the company, for convenience and absorbed its assets. CDI was the primary contractor at some of Holtec’s nuclear decommissioning sites such as Massachusetts’s Pilgrim plant and Palisades in Michigan.
Slovenian rad waste repository behind schedule, minister says
A planned repository for Slovenian spent nuclear fuel will likely not be completed as scheduled, the country’s environmental minister told a local council last week.
According to state media service the Slovenian Press Agency, environmental and spatial planning minister Andrej Vizjak told the city council of Krško, Slovenia, that the proposed repository would not be completed by 2025 as originally planned. Vizjak assured the council that Ljubljana was doing everything it could to make sure that construction proceeds on schedule, the Press Agency reported.
Krško, located in eastern Slovenia near the Croatian border, is home to the country’s only nuclear power plant composed of a single Westinghouse reactor unit. The plant opened in 1983 and was built as a joint venture between Slovenia and Croatia.
