NANO outlines progress on HALEU transport package

The US company says the High-Assay Low-Enriched Uranium fuel (HALEU) transportation package being developed is designed to support the transport of multiple advanced nuclear fuel types, including: uranium oxide fuels; TRISO particle fuels; uranium-zirconium hydride fuels; uranium mononitride fuels; and molten salt reactor fuels.

The project involves NANO Nuclear's "licensed nuclear fuel transportation basket design, developed with the technical support of GNS Gesellschaft für Nuklear-Service mbH (GNS), one of the world's foremost specialists in the treatment, packaging, and transportation of radioactive materials".

The progress update follows a September 2024 agreement between NANO Nuclear and Germany’s GNS to advance a "robust, innovative, and regulatory-compliant HALEU transportation package, designed to support the rapidly growing demand for advanced nuclear fuels needed for next-generation reactor technologies".

The milestones highlighted are the development of conceptual designs for two optimised fuel payload baskets capable of transporting HALEU material in multiple fuel forms and the preliminary design for the transport package overpack, which will house the payload baskets during shipment.

Initial regulatory and engineering analyses have been conducted to evaluate compliance with nuclear transportation regulations. The next phase is for further engineering validation and regulatory engagement, and formally engaging with the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to pursue certification for the transport package.

Jay Yu, Founder and Chairman of NANO Nuclear, said: "HALEU fuel logistics will be one of the foundational pillars of the advanced nuclear industry. Achieving this early design milestone represents an important step toward building the infrastructure needed to support the deployment of advanced reactors across the United States and globally."

HALEU - uranium enriched to contain between 5% and 20% uranium-235 - will be used by many advanced reactors. The USA is working to build up its supply chain for the material: it has recently allocated USD2.7 billion in funding to strengthen the supply chain for both low-enriched uranium and HALEU. The HALEU Availability Program was established as long ago as 2020 to secure a domestic supply of HALEU for civilian domestic research, development, demonstration, and commercial use, to enable nuclear developers to request HALEU material from DOE sources, including material from the National Nuclear Security Administration.

NANO Nuclear is developing the KRONOS micro modular reactor (MMR), a 45 MW thermal, 15 MW electrical high-temperature gas-cooled reactor, using TRISO (tri-structural isotropic) fuel in prismatic graphite blocks and has a sealed transportable core. NANO says its MMR uses no water and has no need for an electrical grid or infrastructure support and can be transported by road and assembled on site.

It says that by developing its own optimised HALEU transportation solution, it "aims to help remove a key logistical bottleneck facing the advanced nuclear sector".