The second reactor of the High Temperature Gas Cooled Reactor-Pebble-bed Module at the Shidaowan plant in China’s Shandong province has reached criticality for the first time, China Huaneng has announced. The first of the unit's twin reactors achieved first criticality in September.  

Construction of a small modular reactor at Darlington in Ontario will open up global export markets worth many hundreds of billions of dollars over the next several decades for whichever technology is chosen by Ontario Power Generation, a new study prepared for SMR developer Terrestrial Energy has found.
 

British engineering group Rolls-Royce has announced the establishment of a new business - Rolls-Royce SMR Limited - for the deployment and commercialisation of its small modular reactor technology. The announcement follows the securing of GBP210 million (USD285 million) in funding from the UK government, matched by more than GBP250 million of private investment. 

A contract has been signed to complete the main concrete works of Argentina's CAREM-25 small reactor. Henisa Sudamericana will employ up to 250 workers in the work, which is central to the project, according to a government announcement.

The Chinese shipbuilder Wison Heavy Industry will provide the hulls for the Cape Nagloynyn floating nuclear power plant, according to a report by TASS. The rated power of the plant has also dropped since its first announcement.

NuScale Power and Romanian national nuclear company Nuclearelectrica yesterday signed a teaming agreement to advance the deployment of NuScale's small modular reactor technology in Romania. The signing came a day after plans for the cooperation were announced on the sidelines of the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow.

NuScale Power of the USA and Romanian national nuclear company Nuclearelectrica plan to construct a NuScale small modular reactor plant in Romania by 2028. The announcement came during a meeting yesterday between US Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry and Romanian President Klaus Iohannis on the sidelines of the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow.

The preliminary design of X-energy's TRISO-X Fuel Fabrication Facility to produce tri-structural isotropic fuel on a commercial scale has now been completed, X-energy and Centrus Energy Corp announced today. The companies have also signed a contract for nuclear fuel and services provider Centrus to continue its work as the project enters its next phase.

Bulgarian Energy Holding has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with US engineering firm Fluor to look at the possibility of replacing coal boilers with NuScale small nuclear reactors, among other things. The country has committed to stop using coal for electricity generation by 2037 or 2040.

The eVinci micro-reactor can provide necessary, clean and cost-competitive energy to decentralised, off-grid markets in Canada, a feasibility report prepared by Bruce Power and Westinghouse has found.

The US Air Force has confirmed the Eielson base in Alaska as the facility planned to host its first small nuclear power plant. A microreactor of up to 5 MWe could be operational there as soon as 2027, according to Eielson.

The steel containment vessel bottom head has been installed for the ACP100 small modular reactor demonstration project at the Changjiang nuclear power plant on China's island province of Hainan. China National Nuclear Corporation said the milestone lays a solid foundation for the subsequent construction of the main structure of what it says will be the world's first land-based commercial SMR.