Sellafield recruitment opens for Authorised Firearms Officers
The CNC has opened AFO recruitment at Sellafield as part of a rolling programme to sustain armed protection at one of the UK’s most sensitive nuclear sites.
The Civil Nuclear Constabulary (CNC) has opened recruitment for Authorised Firearms Officers (AFO) at Sellafield as part of a rolling national programme to sustain continuous armed protection at one of the UK’s most sensitive nuclear sites.
The CNC provides 24/7 armed policing to protect civil nuclear sites, materials and facilities across England and Scotland. Maintaining that capability requires ongoing recruitment and training to ensure operational resilience and a deterrent to those who would threaten critical national infrastructure………
Civil Nuclear Constabulary 3rd March 2026,
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/sellafield-recruitment-opens-for-authorised-firearms-officers
New Addition to List of Nuclear Near Catastrophes
By David Swanson, World BEYOND War, February 23, 2026, https://worldbeyondwar.org/new-addition-to-list-of-nuclear-near-catastrophes/
There are many lists of nuclear close calls. We have a new one to add.
On Monday I visited a site in Caracas, Venezuela, where, very early in the morning on January 3, two powerful missiles slammed into the top of a hill, several feet apart, both beneath a tall telecommunications tower. The tower is largely gone. Debris flew for great distances — many times the distance of 270 meters to a nuclear reactor (white in the background in the photo above on original) and nuclear storage facility. The Earth shook. Buildings a great distance away were damaged and glass windows broken. A building adjacent to the nuclear reactor had rooms most significantly damaged. Electricity was cut off to a wide area, including to the nuclear reactor.
Any use of force whatsoever on any target at all is excessive when attacking someone’s country with violence, but it’s likely that much less force than two massive missiles could have sufficed for the crime of depriving people of electricity and communications. It’s also possible that something could have gone slightly wrong, resulting in a need to evacuate millions of men, women, children, and infants.
Does this bode well for the crime, threatened yet again, of attacking Iran? Will care be taken to avoid nuclear disasters, or in fact will such care be strictly avoided?
Or if Trump loses interest in Iran, could worse be in store for Venezuela?
The site of this nearly nuclear attack was the Venezuelan Institute of Scientific Research, a non-military facility. The nuclear reactor is for medical purposes, and nuclear materials are returned to this site from hospitals for storage.
The missiles were reportedly fired from perhaps a kilometer away by an F-35 — a wonderful airplane with its own long list of horrors and disasters.
The attack put a halt to research at the institute, and — according to people who had worked there for 30 years — was the first crime of any kind committed on the campus.
Workers were able to use generators and then to restore some power to the reactor in 4 days and full power in 10 days. There is talk of rebuilding the tower. There has also been a proposal to build a memorial on the site.
Visiting this location was part of the fourth day of a peace delegation to Venezuela. See reports on the first three days here:
Babcock CEO responds to Rosyth nuclear handling concerns
Dunfermline Press 25th Feb 2026, By Hannah Shedden
Babcock International Group’s CEO has sought to reassure residents who are concerned about the potential presence of nuclear weapons or waste at Rosyth Dockyard.
Fears were raised after SNP councillor Brian Goodall said that iodine tablets to counteract the effects of radiation would need to be given to “half the population of Rosyth” if proposals to bring more nuclear subs to the dockyard went ahead.
Cllr Goodall highlighted the “seriousness of the implications” of providing a contingency dock for the Dreadnought class of vessels that could be carrying Trident missiles.
His comments last year then prompted a row between the councillor and Labour MP, Graeme Downie, who accused Cllr Goodall of spreading “misinformation” and “arguing against highly skilled nuclear jobs in the safe dismantlement of nuclear subs at Rosyth”.
The Press spoke to Babcock CEO, David Lockwood, and asked him what his response would be to those who are fearful about nuclear materials in Rosyth.
He said: “I would say that we are the largest nuclear company in the UK and probably have the most experience handling civilian and military waste than anyone else, so I think you can take a lot of assurance from that…………………..
https://www.dunfermlinepress.com/news/25885325.babcock-ceo-responds-rosyth-nuclear-handling-concerns/
Nuclear power station workers ‘failed to ensure safety’ after incident.
Nuclear watchdog said the electrical cabling failing presented a ‘significant potential risk’
Matthew Fulton, STV News, Feb 25th, 2026
Workers at a nuclear station in Ayrshire “failed to ensure safety” after an electrical cabling incident, according to the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR).
The ONR issued an improvement notice to EDF Energy following the incident at its Hunterston B site near West Kilbride.
In November, workers failed to ensure that the electrical cabling was “deployed safely” while undertaking work on the cooling water valves in one of the facilities on the site.
The independent nuclear regulator said that although no injuries were sustained, the incident presented a “significant potential risk to worker safety”.
The notice requires EDF Energy to review, revise and implement arrangements to ensure that all 415V portable equipment at Hunterston B is appropriately constructed, maintained, tested and controlled.
ows an incident at Hunterston B .
Feb 25th, 2026 at 10:59
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Workers at a nuclear station in Ayrshire “failed to ensure safety” after an electrical cabling incident, according to the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR).
The ONR issued an improvement notice to EDF Energy following the incident at its Hunterston B site near West Kilbride.
In November, workers failed to ensure that the electrical cabling was “deployed safely” while undertaking work on the cooling water valves in one of the facilities on the site.
The independent nuclear regulator said that although no injuries were sustained, the incident presented a “significant potential risk to worker safety”.
The notice requires EDF Energy to review, revise and implement arrangements to ensure that all 415V portable equipment at Hunterston B is appropriately constructed, maintained, tested and controlled.
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The ONR called for EDF to “strengthen its risk assessment processes” and improve arrangements for personnel undertaking electrical work on the site.
Tom Eagleton, ONR’s Head of Safety Regulation, Decommissioning, Fuel and Waste sites, said: “The safety of workers at nuclear licensed sites is a key priority for us. While no one was hurt on this occasion, the potential for serious harm was significant.
“It’s essential that EDF Energy implements the necessary improvements to ensure this cannot happen again.”
The energy firm is required to comply with the notice by March 20……………….. https://news.stv.tv/west-central/hunterston-nuclear-station-workers-failed-to-ensure-safety-after-electrical-cabling-incident
‘Making America Unsafe Again’: Alarm Over Environmental Review Exemption for Nuclear Reactors
“I think the DOE’s attempts to cut corners on safety, security, and environmental protections are posing a grave risk to public health, safety, and our natural environment,” said one expert.
By Jessica Corbett, February 18, 2026, https://worth.com/trump-nuclear-safety-changes/
ess than a week after NPR revealed that “the Trump administration has overhauled a set of nuclear safety directives and shared them with the companies it is charged with regulating, without making the new rules available to the public,” the U.S. Department of Energy announced Monday that it is allowing firms building experimental nuclear reactors to seek exemptions from legally required environmental reviews.
Citing executive orders signed by President Donald Trump in May, a notice published in the Federal Register states that the DOE “is establishing a categorical exclusion for authorization, siting, construction, operation, reauthorization, and decommissioning of advanced nuclear reactors for inclusion in its National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) implementing procedures.”
NEPA has long been a target of energy industries and Republican elected officials, including Trump. The exemption policy has been expected since Trump’s May orders—which also launched a DOE pilot program to rapidly build the experimental reactors—and the department said in a statement that even the exempted reactors will face some reviews.
“The U.S. Department of Energy is establishing the potential option to obtain a streamlined approach for advanced nuclear reactors as part of the environmental review performed under NEPA,” the DOE said. “The analysis on each reactor being considered will be informed by previously completed environmental reviews for similar advanced nuclear technologies.”
“The fact is that any nuclear reactor, no matter how small, no matter how safe it looks on paper, is potentially subject to severe accidents.”
However, the DOE announcement alarmed various experts, including Daniel P. Aldrich, director of the Resilience Studies Program at Northeastern University, who wrote on social media: “Making America unsafe again: Trump created an exclusion for new experimental reactors from disclosing how their construction and operation might harm the environment, and from a written, public assessment of the possible consequences of a nuclear accident.”
Foreign policy reporter Laura Rozen described the policy as “terrifying,” while Paul Dorfman, chair of the Nuclear Consulting Group and a scholar at the University of Sussex’s Bennett Institute for Innovation and Policy Acceleration, called it “truly crazy.”
As NPR reported Monday:
Until now, the test reactor designs currently under construction have primarily existed on paper, according to Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit environmental advocacy group. He believes the lack of real-world experience with the reactors means that they should be subject to more rigorous safety and environmental reviews before they’re built.
“The fact is that any nuclear reactor, no matter how small, no matter how safe it looks on paper, is potentially subject to severe accidents,” Lyman said.
“I think the DOE’s attempts to cut corners on safety, security, and environmental protections are posing a grave risk to public health, safety, and our natural environment here in the United States,” he added.
Lyman was also among the experts who criticized changes that NPR exposed last week, after senior editor and correspondent Geoff Brumfiel obtained documents detailing updates to “departmental orders, which dictate requirements for almost every aspect of the reactors’ operations—including safety systems, environmental protections, site security, and accident investigations.”
While the DOE said that it shared early versions of the rules with companies, “the reduction of unnecessary regulations will increase innovation in the industry without jeopardizing safety,” and “the department anticipates publicly posting the directives later this year,” Brumfiel noted that the orders he saw weren’t labeled as drafts and had the word “approved” on their cover pages.
In a lengthy statement about last week’s reporting, Lyman said on the Union of Concerned Scientists website that “this deeply troubling development confirms my worst fears about the dire state of nuclear power safety and security oversight under the Trump administration. Such a brazen rewriting of hundreds of crucial safeguards for the public underscores why preservation of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) as an independent, transparent nuclear regulator is so critical.”
“The Energy Department has not only taken a sledgehammer to the basic principles that underlie effective nuclear regulation, but it has also done so in the shadows, keeping the public in the dark,” he continued. “These long-standing principles were developed over the course of many decades and consider lessons learned from painful events such as the Chernobyl and Fukushima disasters. This is a massive experiment in the deregulation of novel, untested nuclear facilities that could pose grave threats to public health and safety.”
“These drastic changes may extend beyond the Reactor Pilot Program, which was created by President Trump last year to circumvent the more rigorous licensing rules employed by the NRC,” Lyman warned. “While the DOE created a legally dubious framework to designate these reactors as ‘test’ reactors to bypass the NRC’s statutory authority, these dramatic alterations may further weaken standards used in the broader DOE authorization process and propagate across the entire fleet of commercial nuclear facilities, severely degrading nuclear safety throughout the United States.”
UK regulators to begin formal assessment of TerraPower’s 345MWe sodium-cooled fast reactor.
New Civil Engineer 23rd Feb 2026, By Thomas Johnson
UK regulators have been asked to begin a formal assessment of the Natrium nuclear reactor design developed by US company TerraPower.
The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) told the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR), the Environment Agency and Natural Resources Wales to prepare for a Generic Design Assessment (GDA) of the sodium-cooled fast reactor after a readiness review concluded the design is prepared to enter the regulatory process. The GDA will not start until the regulators have agreed timetables and resourcing.
The GDA is a multi-year scrutiny process in which regulators examine the safety, security and environmental arrangements for a reactor design before any site-specific consents or construction are made. It has been used for previous new-build designs and is intended to give investors and potential operators clearer regulatory certainty.
TerraPower, co-founded by Microsoft’s Bill Gates, is developing the Natrium design as part of a US public–private partnership. The company’s first demonstration plant is being built with support from the US Department of Energy’s Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program (ARDP). The ARDP allows up to $2bn (£1.5bn) in federal funding for the project on a 50:50 cost-share basis; TerraPower and its partners are expected to match that investment……………………………………………………………………………………
sodium-cooled reactors pose different technical and regulatory challenges to light-water designs. Liquid sodium reacts chemically with water and air, which requires specialised handling, testing and safety arrangements…………………………..
https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest/uk-regulators-to-begin-formal-assessment-of-terrapowers-345mwe-sodium-cooled-fast-reactor-23-02-2026/
Massive military convoy carrying ‘nuclear weapons’ passes through Glasgow.
Footage captured on Thursday shows the convoy headed along the M74 motorway towards Kinning Park
Jordan Shepherd Reporter, 20 Feb 2026, https://www.glasgowlive.co.uk/news/glasgow-news/massive-military-convoy-carrying-nuclear-33464341
A massive military convoy believed to be carrying nuclear weapons has been spotted passing through Glasgow..
Footage captured on Thursday shows the convoy headed along the M74 motorway towards Kinning Park. The clip shows MOD police vehicles and Police Scotland escorting the military vehicles through the city.
The convoys usually travel between Atomic Weapons Establishment Burghfield near Reading and RNAD Coulport on Loch Long, right through Glasgow on the M74 and M8, passing within 1.5 miles of George Square in the process.
It is understood that the convoys make the journey around six times per year to refurbish the warheads, then transport them back up again.
The convoys include huge lead-lined lorries carrying the nuclear warheads, along with a fire engine in case a blaze breaks out, a moving workshop, a decontamination unit, tow truck and scores of MOD police vehicles.
Ministry of Defence’s nuclear clean-up project brings new risks.
21st February, By Lynn Jamieson, chair, Scottish Campaign Nuclear Disarmament:
ROSYTH dockyard leads in the clean-up of retired nuclear
submarines as part of the Submarine Dismantling Project (SDP). Addressing a
legacy mess affords opportunities for building a skilled workforce.
But please, no more mess. Rosyth may become more deadly if operational
nuclear-armed submarines station there. As a contingency docking station
for the nuclear-weapon system now under construction, radioactive risks
will increase from nuclear reactors and weapons. T
he Ministry of Defence
(MoD) has not ruled out nuclear bombs being onboard a temporarily docked
submarine at Rosyth. In 40 years, newly built reactors become a long-term
legacy of nuclear waste, sitting in another generation of retired
submarines to be decommissioned at enormous cost.
Since the 1980s,
intermediate-level radioactive waste in the form of retired nuclear-powered
submarines – currently seven in total – sit at Rosyth, a hazard costing
money every day. Fifteen more sit in Devonport Royal Dockyard, Plymouth. Of
the 15 vessels at Devonport, 10 retain the highly radioactive fuel rods
that once powered them.
The National 21st Feb 2026,
https://www.thenational.scot/politics/25874840.mods-nuclear-clean-up-project-brings-new-risks/
Russian nuclear agency insists it can run seized Ukrainian atomic power plant
Europe’s largest atomic power station was seized by Russia from Ukraine in 2022
Guy Faulconbridge, Thursday 12 February 2026 , https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/rosatom-zaporizhzhia-plant-ukraine-russia-b2919153.html
Russia’s state nuclear corporation, Rosatom, has rejected Ukrainian accusations that it lacks the necessary equipment and components to safely operate the Soviet-built Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.
The claims were made by Pavlo Kovtoniuk, head of Ukraine’s state nuclear firm Energoatom, who told Reuters in Kyiv that Russia’s alleged deficiencies could lead to a nuclear accident if it attempted to restart the reactors.
Mr Kovtoniuk stated Russia lacked some equipment and spare parts to operate the plant, and risked a nuclear accident if it tried to restart the reactors.
Europe’s largest atomic power station, the facility was seized by Russia from Ukraine in 2022.
All six of its Soviet-designed VVER-1000 pressurised water reactors are currently in a “cold shutdown” state.
The plant’s future remains a critical point of contention in ongoing peace negotiations between Moscow and Kyiv, with both nations vying for control.
“Rosatom categorically rejects claims that Russia lacks the equipment and components required to ensure the safe operation of the Zaporozhskaya Nuclear Power Plant,” Rosatom said in a statement to Reuters in English when asked about the remarks.
“Russia operates one of the world’s largest nuclear fleets, including VVER-1000 units identical to those installed at Zaporozhskaya NPP, and has full capacity to produce equipment, components and nuclear fuel.”
Rosatom, ranked as one of the world’s biggest nuclear corporations in terms of nuclear construction, enrichment services and mining, said that the key issue affecting nuclear safety at the plant was continued shelling in the area.
Ukraine’s Kovtoniuk argued that control equipment and monitoring systems at the plant were Ukrainian, that Russia would have to replace US fuel in the reactors, and that there was not enough water to cool the reactors if restarted.
“Insinuations implying that the plant’s systems are incompatible with Russian fuel are technically unfounded,” Rosatom said, adding that in late 2025, reactor No. 1 received a 10-year operating licence from Russia’s nuclear safety authority, Rostechnadzor.
Rosatom said the plant’s cooling system had never depended exclusively on the Kakhovka reservoir, adding that the cooling pond used a closed-loop system and had sufficient water.
France must start to plan nuclear closures – safety chief
Muriel Boselli, 27 Jan 2026
(Montel) France must plan now for the closure of some nuclear reactors or face investment barriers “that would be impossible to overcome” in replacing them, the head of the ASNR nuclear safety authority said on Tuesday…………………………(registered readers only)…………….. https://montelnews.com/news/4dfe0284-3e2b-4c92-804f-56a79bdfea31/france-must-start-to-plan-nuclear-closures-safety-chief
‘Significant’ fire risks at nuclear plant site
Maisie Lillywhite, West of England, 4 Feb 26, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cgqexej138jo
‘Significant’ fire risks have been uncovered at the first nuclear plant to be built in Britain for 30 years, including flammable materials left on emergency exit stairs.
Inspectors from the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) said they found significant fire safety shortfalls at Hinkley Point C, EDF’s twin-reactor nuclear power station in Somerset.
The ONR has served enforcement action notices on five organisations which are overseeing mechanical, electrical and heating (MEH) and ventilation and air conditioning work (HVAC) at the site.
Bosses of the five organisations will need to address the shortfalls ahead of the next inspection.
A spokesperson for Hinkley Point C said they are working closely with contract partners to ensure that the appropriate enhancements are made.
“Safety is our overriding priority, and we are already acting to oversee improvements,” they added.
Mahtab Khan, ONR’s head of regulation, said fire safety is not optional and it is a legal requirement that protects lives.
“We will not hesitate to take enforcement action where safety standards fall short, and we expect all dutyholders to treat fire safety with the urgency it demands.
“Working alongside the principal contractor and MEH alliance, we have made good progress in understanding the root causes of these shortfalls to ensure they are addressed,” Khan added.
The Hinkley Point C contractors given fire enforcement notices are Altrad Babcock, Altrad Services, Balfour Beatty Kilpatrick Ltd, Cavendish Nuclear, and NG Bailey.
The combustible material, found during an inspection in December, was discovered in the staircase and was waste typical of construction activities, the ONR said.
It added although the waste did not block the fire exit, it could have compromised access to the building in the event of a fire.
Inspectors found the construction site did not have an adequate fire risk assessment.
There were also insufficient means of escape exits for the number of people working in the building.
The ONR said the shortfalls had no direct impact on the likelihood of a fire, but that the enforcement means adequate routes should be available to workers in the event of a fire.
It comes after inspectors found there was a “risk of serious injury” due to “inadequate fire controls” being used by civil engineering firm Bylor JV, which is run by both Laing O’Rourke and Bouygues Travaux Publics.
In December, the company was served with a fire safety notice and was told it had until June to implement changes.
The estimated cost of Hinkley Point C has risen to £46bn from the £18bn predicted in 2017, and it is expected to open in 2031.
Trump slashing nuclear reactor safety and security rules
January 29, 2026, https://beyondnuclear.org/trump-slashing-reactor-safety-and-security-rule
Department of Energy executes White House Executive Order
Radical changes to nuclear safety and security at new reactors withheld from public review
In response to White House Executive Order 14301 issued on May 23, 2025, the US Department of Energy (DOE) is deregulating federal reactor safety /security standards and rules in order to expedite at least three experimental designs of eleven new advanced reactors. The DOE cuts are intended to speed up licensing, construction and operational testing phase so as to achieve reactor criticality by July 4, 2026. The expedited approval process will be used to demonstrate proof-of-product for full commercial operation of these designs as ready for mass assembly line production.
National Public Radio (NPR) reported on January 28, 2026, that it had obtained copies of the DOE documents as the basis for their news story headlined “The Trump administration has secretly rewritten nuclear safety rules.” The new rules and standards for reactor safety and security of unproven experimental reactor designs have not yet been publicly released. As NPR reports, the new rules are being rewritten to alter 5o years of duly promulgated regulatory law by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) not to bolster public safety, national security and environmental protection but to hasten the deployment of unproven, untested and still dangerous nuclear power technology.
In an earlier NRC interview on December 17, 2025. Dr. Allison Macfarlane, a former NRC Chairwoman, warned that the federal government cannot both commercially promote nuclear power and independently regulate nuclear safety and security with reasonable assure a very low probability of the next severe nuclear accident or by deliberate malice. On numerous occasions, Dr. Macfarlane, other NRC Commissioners and independent scientists point to an established historical conflict of interest created by federal government and nuclear industry’s simultaneous collaborative promotion and regulatory expansion of nuclear power and nuclear arms race.
That proved to be the downfall of the US Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) principally established for the development of atomic bombs and cogenerate electricity from the waste heat from the weaponization of the atom. The AEC was subsequently abolished by Congress with the passage of the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974 (ERDA) because of gross neglience of nuclear safety. On January 19, 1975, the AEC responsibilities were divided up creating the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to take over the safety licensing and regulation of commercial nuclear power and the Energy Research and Development Agency (ERDA) to handle energy research, development, and the functions of nuclear weapons production. ERDA was later incorporated into the US Department of Energy in 1977.
The United States has now come full circle with the Trump Administration’s executive orders dismantling 50 years of promulgation of nuclear power safety regulation and regulatory law to return safety to the back seat and nuclear energy promotion as the priority. It is further alarming and no secret that several of the new commercial reactor designs under licensing review by the DOE are in fact “dual purpose” reactors that once operational will have the capability to produce both electrical energy and the basic building blocks for nuclear weapon enhancement and expansion.
The January 28th NPR analysis finds that DOE’s nuclear rules “slash hundreds of pages of requirements for security at the reactors. They also loosen protections for groundwater and the environment and eliminate at least one key safety role. The new orders cut back on requirements for keeping records, and they raise the amount of radiation a worker can be exposed to before an official accident investigation is triggered.”
Where the protection of groundwater from radioactive contamination once was required as a “must,” the new DOE rules and standards need only provide “‘consideration’ to ‘avoiding or minimizing’ radioactive contamination. Radioactive monitoring and documentation are also softened,” NPR observed.
An independent scientist is quoted in the NPR story, “They’re taking a wrecking ball to the system of nuclear safety and security regulation oversight that has kept the U.S. from having another Three Mile Island accident,’ said Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists. ‘I am absolutely worried about the safety of these reactors.’”
Now here we are, during the 50th anniversary of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Trump Administration, the DOE and the nuclear industry are poised for “Unleashing American Energy” by deregulatory Executive Orders.
The DOE announced the “Reactor Pilot Program” in June 2025, following the release of Executive Order 14301, which accelerates and expands the federal experimental reactor testing program to streamline commercial reactor licensing and oversight. At the same time, the Trump Administration is deregulating the NRC by slashing its safety and security standards and regulatory law.
The DOE “Pilot Reactor Program” is comprised of eleven projects. The DOE will choose at least three units to be licensed for operational criticality by July 4, 2026:
- Aalo Atomics Inc.—The Austin, Texas-based startup nuclear company has broken ground for its experimental 10 MWe sodium cooled reactor under development at the Idaho National Laboratory near Idaho Falls, Idaho. Five units are intended to make up a 50 MWe “pod” for electrical power production.
- Antares Nuclear Inc.— Headquartered in Los Angeles, California, Antares Nuclear has submitted a construction permit application filed for a four-unit, non-power, light-water-cooled, pool-type Versatile Isotope Production Reactor facility to be located at the Idaho National Laboratory desert site, in Bingham County, Idaho.
- Atomic Alchemy Inc.—Atomic Alchemy Inc. is headquartered in Idaho National Laboratory, Idaho Falls, Idaho. The company operates in the nuclear technology sector, specifically focused on non-power radioisotope production reactors for the defense, industrial and medical sectors using the 15-MWtVersatile Isotope Production Reactor (VIPR).
- Deep Fission, Inc.— The start-up company is headquartered in Berkeley, CA for the development of a 15 MWe pressurized water microreactor that first broke ground in Parsons, Kansas on December 9, 2025. It is proposed as a first-of-a-kind deep geological reactor at the Great Plains Industrial Park in Labette County on the Kansas-Oklahoma border. Deep Fission signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with its “sister” company Deep Isolation to collocate the power generation facility in a mile deep 30 inch wide borehole in the bedrock. The natural bedrock body and a mile deep column of water overhead are credited for the reactor containment system. The same borehole and bedrock body are credited as a permanent, deep geological high-level radioactive waste disposal facility. After seven years of operation, the reactor vessel is disconnected from the surface turbogenerator and control room and abandoned, capped and sealed in place in-place at the bottom of the borehole. The next fresh fuel loaded reactor unit is lowered down the borehole and connected to the surface to resume operation stacked on top of the now sealed unit nuclear waste unit. And so on.
- Last Energy Inc.—Last Energy Inc. corporate headquarters are in Austin, Texas. The start-up company is proposing to build a fleet of 20-MWe micro-modular reactors near Abilene, Texas targeting data center power needs (specifically the PWR-20, a downsized model of the currently operational commercially sized Point Beach reactor Unit 1 rated at 625 MWe in Wisconsin).
- Oklo Inc. (two projects)— Oklo Inc. is headquartered in Santa Clara, California. Its Aurora Powerhouse is a 75 MWe small modular liquid sodium-cooled fast reactor under development at the Idaho National Laboratory. Oklo is additional developing an estimated $1.7 billion project to build the nation’s first privately funded nuclear fuel recycling facility at the Oak Ridge Heritage Center in Tennessee. This project aims to recycle used nuclear fuel from existing reactors into fuel for fast reactors, with operations targeted for 2030. The proposed fast reactors are identified as a global nuclear weapons proliferation risk to be exported around the world.
- Natura Resources LLC— Natura Resources is headquartered in Abilene, Texas. The company is developing a Generation IV liquid-fueled molten salt reactor (MSR). They are proposing to site their first reactor at the Science and Engineering Research Center (SERC) on the campus of Abilene Christian University in Abilene, Texas.
- Radiant Industries Inc.— Radiant Industries is headquartered in El Segundo, California for modular microreactors. Radiant has announced that it will build its first microreactor factory on a decommissioned Manhattan Project site in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. World Nuclear News reports, “Radiant is developing the 1 MWe Kaleidos high-temperature gas-cooled portable microreactor, which will use a graphite core and TRISO (tri-structural isotropic) fuel. The electric power generator, cooling system, reactor, and shielding are all packaged in a single shipping container, facilitating rapid deployment.”
- Terrestrial Energy Inc.— Terrestrial Energy, Inc. is headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina. They are developing the Integral Molten Salt Reactor (IMSR) which is a Generation IV small modular reactor (SMR) designed to produce both high-grade industrial heat and electricity. Their pilot project is planned for the Texas A&M University RELLIS Campus in Bryan, Texas.
- Valar Atomics Inc.— Valar Atomics Inc. is headquartered in El Segundo, California. The company is developing the Ward 250, a 100-kWt, helium-cooled, TRISO-fueled high-temperature gas reactor (HTGR) designed for modular, behind-the-meter, or microgrid use. The pilot project is located at the Utah San Rafael Energy Lab (USREL) in Emery County, Utah.
UN watchdog warns Ukraine war remains world’s biggest threat to nuclear safety.
30 January 2026, https://news.un.org/en/story/2026/01/1166863
The war in Ukraine remains the world’s biggest threat to nuclear safety as a fifth year of combat looms, the head of the UN nuclear watchdog warned on Friday, citing continued risks to power supplies at nuclear sites vulnerable to fighting nearby.
Addressing the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors, Director General Rafael Grossi said the agency remains focused on preventing a nuclear accident as fighting continues to endanger critical infrastructure.
“The conflict in Ukraine is about to enter its fifth year,” Mr. Grossi said. “It continues to pose the world’s biggest threat to nuclear safety.”
IAEA teams remain deployed at all nuclear power plants affected by the conflict and publish regular updates on nuclear safety and security conditions.
The Board of Governors is the IAEA’s main decision-making body, bringing together representatives of 35 countries to oversee nuclear safety, security and safeguards, and to guide the work of the UN nuclear watchdog. Its current membership includes, among others Russia, the United States, United Kingdom, and France.
Off-site power a critical safety lifeline
Mr. Grossi stressed that a central safety requirement is reliable off-site power – the electricity a plant receives from the national grid. Without it, nuclear sites must rely on backup systems to run cooling and other essential safety functions.
“There must be secure off-site power supply from the grid for all nuclear sites,” he said, pointing to the IAEA’s “Seven Pillars” guidance for nuclear safety during armed conflict, where off-site power is pillar number four.
He also cited Principle 3 of the IAEA’s Five Principles for protecting the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) that “all efforts should be made to ensure off-site power remains available and secure at all times.”
Mr. Grossi said both sets of guidance have broad international support, including from the parties directly involved, and that he has repeatedly called for adherence to them, including at the UN Security Council.
Progress at Zaporizhzhya amid ongoing risks
He reported recent progress at ZNPP, where Europe’s biggest plant was reconnected on 19 January to its last remaining 330-kilovolt backup power line after repairs were carried out under a temporary ceasefire negotiated with Ukrainian and Russian counterparts.
The line had been damaged and disconnected since 2 January, reportedly due to military activity.
Until the reconnection, ZNPP relied on its last remaining 750-kilovolt main line to provide off-site power for safety systems needed to cool its six shutdown reactors and spent fuel pools. IAEA teams are also monitoring the plant’s ability to manage winter conditions, including keeping water in cooling and sprinkler ponds from freezing.
Beyond the plants themselves, Mr. Grossi warned that Ukraine’s electrical substations are also crucial to nuclear safety. “Damage to them undermines nuclear safety and must be avoided,” he said. An IAEA expert mission is now assessing 10 substations vital to nuclear safety amid ongoing strikes on the country’s power infrastructure.
Other nuclear sites also affected
IAEA teams have also reported military activity near other nuclear facilities, including the Chornobyl site, where damage to a critical substation disrupted multiple power lines and forced temporary reliance on emergency diesel generators. The affected lines have since been reconnected.
Mr. Grossi said the IAEA has shown how international institutions can help reduce risks and provide predictability in a volatile war. But, he added, technical measures have limits.
“The best way to ensure nuclear safety and security,” he said, “is to bring this conflict to an end.”
A High-Stakes Effort to Relax Radiation Limits and Restart Nuclear Growth
Oil Price, By Haley Zaremba – Jan 28, 2026
- The Trump administration wants the NRC to reconsider core radiation safety models to accelerate nuclear development.
- Critics warn that weakening safety standards may erode public trust without meaningfully speeding up new reactor construction………………………..
Next month, the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is slated to overhaul the level of radiation that Americans can legally be exposed to in response to an executive order issued by Donald Trump in May of 2025. The Trump administration is seeking to loosen regulations related to the nuclear energy industry in the United States in order to jumpstart the struggling sector.
The United States generates more nuclear energy than any other country, but it won’t hold that distinction for long if current domestic and global trends hold true. The domestic nuclear energy sector has been in near-terminal decline for decades now, and the United States is now home to an aging fleet and very few plans for new and expanded nuclear energy projects.
In large part, this is due to the reality that building a new nuclear reactor is extremely expensive and logistically and bureaucratically nightmarish, leading to long and frequently delayed timelines. Plant Vogtle, the only new nuclear energy plant to be brought online in the United States in decades, was enormously over budget and years behind schedule. When its final reactor finally came online in Waynesboro, Georgia, in 2024, the plant had taken $35 billion and 14 years to reach completion.
In order to avoid such issues, the Trump administration is seeking to minimize the prodigious amount of red tape involved in developing a new nuclear power plant. And it’s targeting public safety measures to do so. The May 23 executive order mandates that the NRC “reconsider reliance on the linear no-threshold (LNT) model for radiation exposure and the ‘as low as reasonably achievable’ standard,” among other requirements, in order to “reestablish the United States as the global leader in nuclear energy.”
However, experts contend that loosening or doing away with the NRC’s licensing and review process could have some major downsides for public health and for the Trump administration’s own aims. “The [Trump] administration may be working against its own long-term goals by short-circuiting the public arbitration process moderated by the NRC that is critical to building and maintaining public acceptance and confidence in nuclear energy,” warned a recent column from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Moreover, the executive order may not even result in an acceleration of nuclear production while unduly and unnecessarily increasing risk factors for Americans, argues a recent op-ed by Katy Huff for Scientific American. “As a nuclear energy advocate and former Department of Energy official,” Huff writes, “I want to see more nuclear energy on the grid soon. But loosening the protections of the linear no-threshold (LNT) model is not supported by current research.”
In the past, such suggestions to the NRC have been tabled because of insufficient evidence to support such a relaxation of radiation protections. Huff argued that, by ignoring these precedents based on rigorous research findings, the executive order is asking the NRC to act politically rather than scientifically. She called for more evidence-gathering on the topic, especially to validate or complicate early findings that raising radiation exposure could pose a particular risk to women and children. …………………………………………………………….https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/A-High-Stakes-Effort-to-Relax-Radiation-Limits-and-Restart-Nuclear-Growth.html
Since 2021, EDF has detected more than 80 significant cracks on its French nuclear reactors.
Since 2021, EDF has detected more than 80 significant cracks on its French
nuclear reactors, and will likely find more in the future, officials from
the Nuclear Safety and Radiation Protection Authority (ASNR) said on
Tuesday.
Montel 27th Jan 2026, https://montelnews.com/fr/news/a5e4816f-9e51-4039-bfa6-ee32fcafb6b4/edf-a-repare-plus-de-80-fissures-sur-ses-reacteurs-asnr
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