Valar Atomics said this week that its technology has achieved zero-power criticality at Los Alamos National Laboratory’s National Criticality Experiments Research Center at the Department of Energy’s Nevada National Security Site.
Hawthrone, Calif.-based nuclear company Valar Atomics said in a Monday press release its tests began Nov.12 and zero-power criticality was achieved Monday at 11:45 a.m. Pacific Time.
Zero-power criticality, or cold criticality, is a self-sustaining nuclear fission chain reaction at very low temperatures that does not produce any usable heat.
“Zero power criticality is a reactor’s first heartbeat, proof the physics holds,” Isaiah Taylor, founder and CEO of Valar Atomics, said. “This moment marks the dawn of a new era in American nuclear engineering; one defined by speed, scale, and private-sector execution with closer federal partnership.”
The Los Alamos research center at the Nevada site and Valar Atomics collaborated through Project Nuclear Observations of Valar Atomics (NOVA) to work on this experiment. Project NOVA is a series of criticality experiments on a high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) tristructural isotropic (TRISO)-fueled core.
Valar Atomics said the project builds on previous work at NRERC, which includes the Deimos critical assembly in 2024.
Valar Atomics is developing Ward 250, a helium-cooled, TRISO-fueled, high-temperature gas reactor.
Valar Atomics is one of 10 companies selected by the Department of Energy’s advanced nuclear reactor pilot program. The program seeks to have three test reactors reach criticality by July 4, 2026.
The company broke ground on its pilot reactor at Utah San Rafael Energy Lab in September.