Publications: Morning Briefing

Polish company Polskie Elektrownie Jądrowe (PEJ) has authorized Westinghouse to start procuring long-lead reactor components for its first AP1000 reactor in Choczewo, Poland. According to Westinghouse’s Oct. 8 press release, this order would cover six of the plant’s reactor components, which include the reactor containment along with its related structural modules. PEJ and Westinghouse expect […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is seeking public comment on Fermi America’s draft environmental impact statement (EIS) for Units 1 – 4 of its Project Matador based in Carson County, Texas. Comments for the draft EIS for the Texas project are due by Nov. 23. According to NRC’s Oct. 9 Federal Register notice, the agency staff […]

The Department of Energy Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant (WTP) at the Hanford Site in Richland, Wash., has now converted 250,000 gallons of less radioactive tank waste into solid glass form. In September, over 39,000 gallons were vitrified into glass form at the WTP’s Direct-Feed Low-Activity Waste (DFLAW) Facility, Bechtel National, which built the plant, […]

General Dynamics (GD) on Wednesday announced Danny Deep will be the company’s next CEO effective Jan. 1, 2027, succeeding Phebe Novakovic, who has been the company’s top executive and chairman since January 2013. Deep has been president of GD since December 2025 and was elected to the company’s board in August. Novakovic will become executive […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Legacy Management last month marked the 20th anniversary of final remediation of the Fernald Site, a former uranium processing facility 20 miles outside of Cincinnati, Ohio. Over 250 people turned out for a Sept. 19 commemoration of the Cold War nuclear site that operated from 1951 until 1986 when […]

NATO will proceed with its annual nuclear deterrence exercise this week despite recent Russian warnings that it could use nuclear weapons if its territory, including Kaliningrad, comes under threat. The 10-day, now declassified Steadfast Noon exercise is scheduled to begin Oct. 13 and will be hosted by Italy, with aircraft from 17 North Atlantic Treaty […]

The Association of the U.S. Army (AUSA) will hold its annual conference in Washington, D.C.,  Oct. 12-14 at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center. The event arrives as the Army is currently without Senate-confirmed top leadership, with both Acting Army Secretary Adam Telle and Army Vice Chief Gen. Christopher LaNeve, who is also currently the […]

The U.S. and China are discussing reciprocal visits to each other’s nuclear facilities, a potential transparency measure as Washington raises concerns about Beijing’s nuclear activities. The Donald Trump administration has held talks with Chinese officials about allowing each country to visit nuclear facilities operated by the other, the Washington Times reported Oct. 8, citing U.S. […]

Urenco USA completed the installation of its sixth new cascade at the National Enrichment Facility in New Mexico, hitting the 75% completion mark in its enrichment expansion plan.  Urenco USA, an affiliate of the European company Urenco, said in a press release the production of the sixth cascade began Oct. 8. The company expects to […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has received the first part of Blue Energy’s construction permit application to build a BWRX-300 small modular reactor in Texas, NRC said last week. According to NRC’s Oct. 8 Federal Register notice, Blue Energy filed the application on Sept. 15, with a limited work authorization to perform certain early construction work […]

A full week into fiscal 2027, the Department of Energy had still not appointed members for the newly-configured Hanford Advisory Board. A DOE spokesperson said late Thursday Oct. 8 that the new members of the citizen advisory board for the Hanford Site in Richland, Wash., have yet to be finalized. DOE had previously targeted Oct. […]

Leidos, the Reston, VA.-based government contractor, has tapped Stephen Vather to be its new senior vice president of investor relations. Vather comes to Leidos from Leonardo DRS, where he was senior vice president of corporate development and investor relations, Leidos said in an Oct. 6 press release. Vather will take over from the retiring Stuart […]

Here are events related to nuclear matters that Exchange Monitor staff are tracking:  OCTOBER: 13: Virtual Forum: ANWA Deterrence Center Forum on “Modernizing the Nation’s Strategic Nuclear Deterrence: The Strategic Role of Golden Dome” at 3-4:30 p.m. Eastern time. 14: Hybrid meeting: The Oak Ridge Site Specific Advisory Board meets starting at 6 p.m. Eastern […]

The Department of Energy’s final request for proposals (RFP) for operation of the 70,000-square-foot 222-S Laboratory at the Hanford Site in Richland, Wash., could be out this month, DOE said in a recent procurement update. That projection, shared Sept. 29 on the online procurement site, SAM.gov, is consistent with the timeline posted by the DOE […]

The United States Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board (NWTRB) appointed Michael Janicke to be its executive director effective Monday, the independent federal agency said. Janicke takes over as the official head of the NWTRB almost a year after the former executive director Daniel Ogg retired from the position in December 2025. Neysa Slater-Chandler was the […]

The Navy awarded more than $170 million in Trident II D5-related contracts Oct. 1, extending flight-test, missile operations, rocket motor storage and other support as the Columbia-class submarine program moves toward service entry. The largest award, a $46.85 million contract to L3Harris Technologies’ Interstate Electronics Corp., covers engineering, logistics, installation, operation, maintenance and modification of […]

If you are in the mood to travel back in time more than a half century and watch government-made black-and-white films designed to make the public feel better about nuclear technology, the Department of Energy can fill that need online. DOE’s Office of Legacy Management recently announced it is offering films from the Atomic Energy […]

Berkeley, Calif.-based Deep Isolation was issued a drilling permit by a Texas state agency for its full-scale, non-nuclear borehole demonstration project in Cameron, Texas, the company said Oct. 1. The Texas Railroad Commission issued the permit. With this regulatory approval, Deep Isolation said in its press release, the borehole disposal pilot project can move from […]

The Air Force and Northrop Grumman have broken ground on a new B-21 Raider final assembly line in Palmdale, Calif., putting a previously announced effort to accelerate bomber production into construction. The new assembly line at Air Force Plant 42 is part of over a million square feet of planned facilities expected to increase annual […]

Anduril Industries and the White House Tuesday announced plans for a new 2 million square foot shipbuilding facility in Maryland that will focus on producing Virginia-class attack submarine (SSN) parts. The new facility, built with a combined $6.6 billion in private capital investment and federal contracting, will be called Arsenal-2 as a nod to Anduril’s […]

BWX Technologies’ microreactor was selected by Prodigy Clean Energy and two Canadian Indigenous tribes to be the technology for the Transportable Nuclear Power Plant at Belledune in New Brunswick, Canada. The BWXT Advanced Nuclear Reactor – or BANR – is designed to be a high-temperature gas-cooled transportable microreactor with a generating capacity of 22 megawatts […]

The Department of Energy’s Microreactor Applications Research Validation and Evaluation (MARVEL) microreactor project progresses towards criticality after recently hitting some milestones, DOE said Tuesday. The MARVEL microreactor project, led by DOE’s Idaho National Laboratory (INL), had its final documented safety analysis approved by DOE’s Idaho Operations Office, INL said in its press release. The lab […]

Ashton Ellaboudy, a Department of Energy employee who has worked at the Hanford Site in Richland, Wash., will appear in federal court Thursday in connection with Justice Department allegations that he aided foreign terrorists, according to an article in the Tri-City Herald. Ellaboudy is in the Benton County jail after being arrested on Thursday Oct. […]

Russian President Vladimir Putin warned Oct. 1 that Russia could use nuclear weapons if NATO attacked Kaliningrad, renewing Moscow’s nuclear threats amid growing military tensions between Russia and the alliance. Speaking at the Valdai Discussion Club, Putin said Russia would respond to an attack on its territory with “all weapons” available to it, according to […]

Constellation Energy continues its pursuit of uprating several of its operating reactors as the company signs its latest power purchase agreement with Google Tuesday. Constellation and Google agreed to a 20-year “clean energy collaboration” to add 890 megawatts of nuclear energy onto the PJM Interconnection grid, according to the press release. The agreement includes investments […]

The Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Dominance Financing issued a conditional loan up to $4.2 billion to provide uprates at several of Vistra Corp’s nuclear power plants in Ohio and Pennsylvania, Energy Secretary Chris Wright said Monday. The announcement came during Wright’s visit to the Vistra’s Perry Nuclear Plant on Monday afternoon. According to […]