Ambient office = 66 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 123 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 122 nanosieverts per hour

Blueberry from Central Market = 87 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 101 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 93 nanosieverts per hour

     Oil and gas producer Diamondback Energy Inc has signed a letter of intent (LoI) on a long-term power purchase agreement to use Oklo’s Aurora powerhouse reactors for its operations in the Permian Basin. Oklo has also signed a deal to supply up to five hundred megawatts of power to Equinix to serve its data centers in the U.S.
     The non-binding LoI with Diamondback outlines a proposed twenty-year power purchase agreement (PPA) focusing on using Aurora powerhouses to supply “reliable and emission-free electricity” to Diamondback’s operations in the Permian. According to the terms of the LoI, Oklo intends to license, construct, and operate powerhouse reactors capable of generating fifty megawatts of electric power to Diamondback E&P LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Diamondback near Midland, Texas.
     The LoI outlines options to renew and extend the potential power purchase agreement for an additional twenty-year term. Oklo’s powerhouse reactor designs are intended to be able to operate forty years. The company’s design-build-own-operate business model means potential customers like Diamondback can purchase power without complex ownership issues or other capital requirements, Oklo said.
Jacob DeWitte is the Diamondback CEO. He said, “By developing and providing a low-cost, high-reliability, and emission-free energy source, Oklo is poised to help meet the growing energy requirements of operators like Diamondback.”
     Oklo has also recently signed a LoI to provide up to five hundred megawatts of power to Equinix, according to an April 2nd filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission by AltC Acquisition Corp. The LoI was executed on the 16th of February. Oklo is in the process of merging with AltC as part of its plans to go public. The coming merger was announced in July 2023.
     The LoI confirms Equinix’s interest in buying power from Oklo’s powerhouses to serve its data centers in the U.S. for a twenty-year according to the filing notes. The power purchase agreements would be renewable for further twenty-year terms. Equinix has made a twenty-five-million-dollar prepayment to Oklo. The filing says it is Permitted Equity Financing. Under the LoI, Equinix would have a right of first refusal for one hundred to five hundred megawatts of output from certain powerhouses for up to thirty-six months.
     Oklo was founded in 2013. It plans to commercialize its liquid metal fast reactor technology in the Aurora ‘powerhouse’. The Aurora is a fast neutron reactor using heat pipes to transport heat from the reactor core to a supercritical carbon dioxide power conversion system to generate electricity. Oklo has received a site use permit from the U.S. Department of Energy for a prototype unit to be constructed at the Idaho National Laboratory.
     In August of 2023, the U.S. Department of the Air Force, in partnership with the Defense Logistics Agency Energy, selected Oklo to site, design, build, own and operate a microreactor facility to deliver electricity and steam at the Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska. Subsequently, Eielson rescinded its Notice of Intent to Award pending the completion of further due diligence and a review of the vendor selection process by the Department of Justice. According to an update on the project issued in January of this year, the Department of the Air Force has said it still intends to meet the 2027 timeline for the project.

Ambient office = 72 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 116 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 114 nanosieverts per hour

Avocado from Central Market = 66 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 93 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 76 nanosieverts per hour

     Clean Core Thorium Energy (Clean Core) recently announced successful completion of the Phase 1 pre-licensing Vendor Design Review (VDR) process with the  Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC).  CNSC is the regulatory authority for Canada Deuterium Uranium (CANDU) reactors. Clean Core has been actively involved with Canada’s nuclear industry with their patented fuel technology, the ANEEL™ fuel. In the completion of Phase 1 and the associated assessment report, no issues were identified by the CNSC that could raise a fundamental barrier to the licensing of the ANEEL™ fuel in Canada.
     The ANEEL™ fuel is made of thorium and high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU). It was developed for use in pressurized heavy water reactors (PHWRs) and Canada deuterium uranium (CANDU) reactors. This fuel has the capability to significantly improve performance with existing proven heavy water reactor systems. It accomplishes this by leveraging thorium’s inherently superior nuclear, thermal and physical properties while retaining the same external dimensions and configuration design as in the currently used Natural Uranium (NU) fuel bundles. Without any significant modifications to the reactor being required, the replacement of the currently utilized NU fuel bundles with Clean Core’s ANEEL™ fuel bundles can reduce life-cycle operating costs and waste volumes. They can also increase safety and accident tolerance, and result in additional proliferation resistance.
     Clean Core has been involved with CNSC since 2022. This includes submissions across nine focus areas in the review, building a licensing basis and safety case for the ANEEL™ fuel. The successful completion of the Phase 1 pre-licensing marks a major milestone for the company and nuclear industry. The ANEEL™ fuel is the first thorium-based fuel for CANDU reactors to successfully complete this phase of the CNSC pre-licensing process for new fuel designs. The pre-licensing process provided an opportunity for Clean Core to show understanding and compliance with Canadian licensing requirements and seek detailed feedback ahead of a formal license application.
    The CNSC concluded in the Executive Summary of assessment report, “Overall, CCTE generally understands and has correctly interpreted the high-level intent of the CNSC’s regulatory requirements as applicable to fuel design and qualification. The findings documented within this report are foreseen to be resolvable.” The Executive Summary will be made available publicly on the CNSC’s website in the near future.
     Mehul Shah is the CEO and Founder of Clean Core. He said, “The work performed through the VDR and our engagements with the CNSC highlights Clean Core’s regulatory and commercial readiness. This is a critical step forward for our ANEEL™ fuel technology and in advancing nuclear power generation across Canada and globally.”
     Clean Core signed a Strategic Partnership Project Agreement with the U.S. Department of Energy. They will begin their irradiation testing and qualification in the Advanced Test Reactor at Idaho National Labs in April 2024 to achieve planned burnup targets of up to 60 giga-watt days per ton. Clean Core has been in actively collaborating and engaging with key industry players including regulators, utilities, and suppliers to achieve a successful commercialization of the ANEEL™ fuel by 2026.

Ambient office = 125 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 131 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 130 nanosieverts per hour

Tomato from Central Market = 89 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 119 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 103 nanosieverts per hour

     X-energy and Cavendish Nuclear have been awarded four and a quarter million dollars by the U.K. government to assess how domestic manufacturing could support the construction of an advanced small pebble-bed nuclear reactor. The pair want to build twelve reactors in Hartlepool by the early 2030s to help decarbonize local industry.
     The government funding comes through the Future Nuclear Enabling Fund (FNEF) which will assist companies to develop their technologies ahead of the government selecting which projects will help meet national targets for more nuclear generation.
     X-energy and Cavendish Nuclear will match the government funding and use the money to review domestic manufacturing and supply chain opportunities. Kier Group, Sheffield Forgemasters, and the Nuclear Advanced Manufacturing Centre will help X-energy and Cavendish Nuclear carry out the assessment. The collaborators want U.K. firms to receive eighty percent of the value of their Xe-100 reactor projects.
     Mick Gornall is the managing director of Cavendish Nuclear. He said, “A fleet of Xe-100s can complement renewables by providing constant or flexible power and produce steam to decarbonize industry and manufacture hydrogen and synthetic transport fuels.”
The Xe-100 is an eighty-megawatt high-temperature gas-cooled reactor design that is optimized to operate as a four-unit plant. This four-unit system will deliver three hundred and twenty megawatts of electricity or two hundred megawatts of heat. The reactor works like a gumball machine with new fuel pebbles the size of billiard balls being fed into the top of the reactor to refresh the older ones being ejected from the bottom of the reactor. Each pebble remains in the core for around three years. They are circulated through the reactor up to six times to achieve full burnup. Helium is cycled through the reactor to extract the heat and feed it to a steam generator.
     The reactor design is currently being examined by regulators in the U.S. and Canada. The partners say they plan to engage with U.K. nuclear regulators to evaluate licensing approaches. In 2022, X-energy signed a letter of intent with Dow to install reactors at one of its U.S. Gulf Coast chemical complexes. Last year Dow selected its Seadrift manufacturing site in Texas. The installed reactors will provide power and steam to the chemicals manufacturing site. CO2 emissions should be reduced by an estimated 440,000 tons per year.
    Carol Tansley is the X-energy vice-president. Speaking in December about a report exploring how novel nuclear reactors could help decarbonize heavy industry, she said, “This is a huge opportunity for Teesside and the country as a whole. There is a skilled nuclear workforce, with decades of experience of high temperature gas reactor technology, already in place at Hartlepool power station and the plant will be reaching the end of its life just as our project entered development and construction. We can provide high quality local jobs and the broadest range of decarbonization options for the area’s industrial base, and then use that experience to benefit similar regions across the U.K.”
     Building on their plans for constructing reactors for Hartlepool, X-energy and Cavendish Nuclear say they want to build as many as 40 Xe-100 reactors in the U.K.
     In February of this year, Westinghouse Electric said it was developing plans for four small modular nuclear reactors near Stockton-on-Tees, which is close to Hartlepool. The reactors would also provide low carbon power for the region’s chemicals industry.