Workshop for EAW #3
Updated:
Workshop #3
A Collaboration between the U.S. Department of Energy
and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission
When: Wednesday, March 18, 2026, 1:00 PM to 4:00 PM EST
Where: Webinar, Microsoft TEAMS
Public Meeting Announcement Available Here
Workshop Slides Available Here
Abstract: Demand for a fuel enrichment range known as high-assay, low-enriched uranium (HALEU) is rapidly increasing, driven by both potential new, advanced power reactors and performance enhancements to existing commercial power reactors. The HALEU Availability Program is addressing existing challenges to the U.S. infrastructure necessary for a commercial-scale enrichment operation that supplies this demand.
However, there is an additional important parallel consideration for a timely transition to HALEU-based fuel cycles, in the realization of new experiments and data needed to assess and support the demonstration of the performance and safety of new HALEU-based systems. A significant component of that data is criticality benchmarks that are relevant for the specific proposed fuel forms, geometries, neutron absorbers, moderators for facility operations, and transportation at commercial scale. The commercial scale component is important, as it is currently possible to produce and transport fissile material at any enrichment in any fuel form in small quantities. The economic viability of HALEU-based fuel cycles is sensitive on being able to safely scale-up the quantity for these specific types of fuel.
Congress recognized this need, and as part of the Inflation Reduction Act, has allocated funds to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to develop criticality safety data and support the industry with transportation challenges, where the latter is a separate activity. Reaffirming this need, recent executive orders 'Deploying Advanced Nuclear Reactor Technologies' and 'Reinvigorating America's Nuclear Industrial Base' (May 23, 2025) have mandated rapid advanced reactor deployment and supporting infrastructure development. This project, through the development of publicly available data and collaboration with the NRC, will reduce the uncertainty associated with assessing commercial-scale facility and transportation operations for the HALEU fuel cycle and directly support those executive orders. Other important partners in this project include the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)/Nuclear Criticality Safety Program (NCSP) as well as the DOE Office of Nuclear Physics (NP).
This webinar - the third (and final) of a series covering several anticipated fuel cycle needs - will briefly summarize the data gaps identified up to this point and then provide information about the upcoming EAW #3. The main goal of the third DNCSH webinar is to focus on data needs to support transportable microreactors. The information collected will be summarized in the third DNCSH Call for Proposals which will address the gaps identified by the DNCSH team.
For additional information, please reach out to the National Technical Director for this effort, Dr. William Wieselquist, via dncsh@ornl.gov.