A new generation of clean energy is on the horizon

Oklo is a clean energy company that has focused on developing a product and service that people want to buy. In 2020, they made history by submitting, and having had the NRC accept, their combined license application for their Aurora powerhouse design.

Over the last couple of years, Oklo has also made notable strides on multiple fronts. They were approved to use a specific site on the Idaho National Laboratory campus to build their first unit. The arrangement includes the grant of a long term site use permit. An environmental assessment is already underway. //

Oklo is developing a “First of a kind” (FOAK) advanced energy system, which typically involves unusual costs and risks that can scare away investors. Yet, Oklo’s simple, safe and small reactor passively cools itself with a design that has already been well proven. They’ve based their modern implementation on the Experimental Breeder Reactor II (EBR-2), that ran for 30 years, providing a wealth of performance data that has helped the NRC regulator get comfortable with the design’s technical capabilities.

Thus, while some might think that Oklo’s first-ever 4th Gen application to the NRC might never be approved, the NRC accepted the application even though it was radically shorter than prior applications submitted for Gen III plants. Under the requirements of the Nuclear Energy Innovation and Modernization Act (NEIMA) the review process is expected to take three years, rather than four to complete. This means that Oklo should have an approved certification in the first half of 2023. //

Doug Coombes says

December 14, 2021 at 7:33 PM

“Oklo further recognized that the INL was storing waste from the EBR-II project and knew that this waste would be well suited to be the fuel for their reactor. They have secured an agreement with the INL to supply this waste and approval from the DOE to use it as fuel in their reactor.”

If it can be bred into fissile fuel like U-238 or Th-232 can or is already fissile like U-235, Pu-239 or other fissile TRUs, is it really waste?

There is a huge amount of fuel currently being stored as “waste” in the US, just waiting for reactors to be built that will burn it. Ed Pheil from Elysium estimates there is enough spent nuclear fuel to power their MCSFRs for 300 hundred years at current demand if they replaced ALL current US energy generation. It would be enough for over 1,000 years if it just replaced current US nuclear power generation.

That’s before we even look at the 470,000 tons of depleted uranium now being stored as “waste” in the US as uranium hexafluoride that can also be bred into fissile plutonium or added directly to the fuel cycle of some fast reactors now being developed.

The quicker we certify and start building these new designs the better.

Engineer-Poet says

December 15, 2021 at 1:34 PM

If it can be bred into fissile fuel like U-238 or Th-232 can or is already fissile like U-235, Pu-239 or other fissile TRUs, is it really waste?

Rhetorical question, I know, but if it was too depleted to be used any further in the EBR-II then it counted as “waste” for that purpose.