Secretary of Energy Chris Wright will accompany Valar Atomics’ Ward250 advanced reactor from California to Utah Feb. 15, the Department of Energy said in an email Tuesday.
The Ward250 reactor will be transported from March Air Force Base (AFB) in California to Hill AFB in Utah. DOE said the reactor would not be fueled and there would not be nuclear material aboard the flight. Following the trip, Wright will host a press conference at Hill AFB with Under Secretary of War for Acquisition and Sustainment Michael Duffey, Utah Governor Spencer Cox, and Valar Atomics CEO Isaiah Taylor.
Taylor told the Monitor this week that while there would be “no official Janus announcements” – referring to the program announced in October by Wright and Secretary of the Army Dan Driscoll to deploy microreactors in the military – at the event Sunday, Valar Atomics will be “demonstrating an important deployment capability along with the Department of War.”
The United States and Armenia signed an agreement to collaborate in civil nuclear power to allow up to $5 billion in U.S. exports to Armenia and an additional $4 billion in longer-term fuel and maintenance contracts, Vice President J.D. Vance said during the Monday press conference.
“This is a classic win-win for both Armenia and the United States of America,” Vance said, adding the agreement is expected to create more jobs in the U.S. Vance and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan signed the 123 Agreement, or an agreement that establishes the legal framework for peaceful civil nuclear cooperation with other countries. The agreement also enables other countries to use U.S.-made nuclear technology for deployment in their respective countries.
Reuters reported Friday that Russian officials did not welcome the idea of the U.S. working with Armenia to build a new nuclear power plant. They said the new plant raised safety concerns due to Armenia being a seismically active region.
The Department of Energy, using its national laboratories, is digitizing 80 years of nuclear research data into a searchable database for future energy and security decisions as part of the Genesis Mission, DOE said in a Thursday press release.
It is part of 26 science and technology projects being carried out in conjunction with the Genesis artificial intelligence (AI), DOE said in the release.
“This commitment to applying cutting-edge science and technology protects our nation, marking a pivotal step towards a more secure, prosperous, and innovative future through collaborative federal efforts,” Brandon Williams, the head of DOE’s National Nuclear Security Administration, said in the release.
A lead Defense Department official for the Golden Dome program last week argued that while technology for homeland missile defense effort is generally all proven out, the limiting factor is affordability and the ability to do things at scale, which she said is improving by reforming acquisition processes.
“So what are we doing about affordability? That is a big challenge for us, affordability. Over time, the department has incentivized industry to build very exquisite weapons, and they have incentivized industry to capitalize on efficiency and not capacity,” Marcia Holmes, deputy director of Golden Dome for America, said Thursday during the Miami Space Summit. “And so now we find ourselves in a place of want, we want more and we want it faster. The Golden Dome program acknowledges that to address the number of threats that we may face in the homeland, we have to address the cost equation.”
Holmes continued that DoD must pursue technology and innovation that will reduce cost per kill and enable a reliable and affordable defense in depth, specifically calling for “weapon designs that can address multiple phases of threat trajectories to enable affordable alternatives.”