INL: NATIONAL REACTOR INNOVATION CENTER’S WEBINAR FEATURES TERRAPOWER, X-ENERGY

IDAHO FALLS – The National Reactor Innovation Center’s (NRIC) webinar “What Inspires Us: Advanced Reactor Demonstrations” will focus on the U.S. Department of Energy awards to TerraPower and X-energy to build their advanced nuclear reactors by 2027.

Ashley Finan, NRIC director, will moderate this 90-minute webinar from 2:30-4 p.m. ET; 12:30-2 p.m. MT on Jan. 7, 2021. It will feature conversations with Chris Levesque, president and chief executive officer of TerraPower and Clay Sell, chief executive officer of X-energy.

“There is a lot of excitement and enthusiasm for these projects,” Finan said. “This is an opportunity to learn more and ask questions.”

The DOE Office of Nuclear Energy selected TerraPower LLC for its Natrium sodium-cooled high-temperature reactor design and X-energy for its Xe-100 high-temperature gas-cooled reactor design, each for $80 million awards, through negotiations under the Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program.

NRIC will facilitate access to DOE’s national lab resources, which can help the companies test and assess advanced reactor development technologies to move reactors from blueprints to reality.

NRIC’s webinar series, “What Inspires Us,” kicked off Sept. 29, 2020, with an overview of NRIC. It included conversations with Mark Peters, former laboratory director at Idaho National Laboratory, and Suzanne Baker, creative director at the University of Michigan’s Fastest Path to Zero Initiative and founder of Good Energy Collective. Both speakers talked about what inspires them to promote nuclear energy as part of the broader clean energy initiative.