MIT Know-how Evaluation launched our checklist of 15 Local weather Tech Firms to Watch lower than two months in the past. Since then, awardee Kairos Energy has had three massive bulletins about its progress towards constructing next-generation nuclear reactors.
Every of those bits of stories represents an fascinating facet of the method. So let’s dig into the bulletins and what they imply for the place nuclear expertise goes.
First, a fast refresher on Kairos Energy: Whereas nuclear crops at present overwhelmingly use pressurized water to maintain reactors cool, Kairos is utilizing molten salt. The thought is that these reactors (that are additionally smaller than these usually constructed at present) will assist generate electrical energy in a manner that’s safer and extra environment friendly than typical nuclear energy.
In the case of technique, Kairos is taking small steps towards the final word objective of full-size energy crops. Building started earlier this yr on Hermes, the corporate’s first nuclear take a look at reactor. That facility will generate a small quantity of warmth—about 35 megawatts’ value—to exhibit the expertise.
Final week, the corporate introduced it acquired a development allow for the subsequent iteration of its system, Hermes 2. This plant will share a location with Hermes, and it’ll embody the infrastructure to remodel warmth to electrical energy. That makes it the primary electricity-producing next-generation nuclear plant to get this approval within the US.
Whereas this information wasn’t an enormous shock (the corporate has been working with the Nuclear Regulatory Fee for years), “any day that you just’re getting a allow or a license from the NRC is an uncommon and big day,” Kairos CEO Mike Laufer instructed me in an interview.
The corporate is creating a plan to work on development for each Hermes and Hermes 2 on the identical time, he added. After I requested if Hermes remains to be on monitor to begin up in 2027 (as we reported in our profile of the corporate in October), Laufer stated that’s an “aggressive timeline.”
Whereas development on take a look at reactors is rolling, Kairos is forging forward with industrial offers—in October, it introduced an settlement with Google to construct as much as 500 megawatts’ value of energy crops by 2035. Underneath this settlement, Kairos will develop, assemble, and function crops and promote electrical energy to the tech large.
