US-based NuScale Power Corporation has awarded a contract to Paragon, a Mirion Technologies company, to complete the final design development of Paragon’s Highly Integrated Protection System (HIPS) for the NuScale Power Module (NPM). This contract finalises the instrumentation and control (I&C) protection infrastructure for NuScale’s small modular reactor (SMR).
The NMP is a pressurised water reactor with all the components for steam generation and heat exchange incorporated into a single 77 MWe unit, using standard light water reactor fuel. It is the first SMR design to receive approval from the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). NuScale offers the units as VOYGR plants with a range of modules: a VOYGR-12 power plant comprising 12 modules is capable of generating 924 MWe.
HIPS was purpose-built to meet today’s cybersecurity requirements and the complexity of next-generation reactor designs. The platform delivers analogue-like reliability while incorporating modern diagnostics that reduce operations and maintenance costs, and its architecture can be configured from a single channel up to a full four-division Reactor Protection System. HIPS also employs Model-Based Design to integrate system behaviour and design documentation into a single environment, streamlining development and regulatory review. This includes NRC Safety Evaluation Report (SER) approval of its topical report in 2017, co-developed with NuScale.
Paragon will complete engineering and design deliverables across three critical safety systems built on the HIPS platform. The Module Protection System (MPS) safeguards individual reactor safety functions. The Safety Data Interface System (SDIS provides critical monitoring capabilities post-accident. The Plant Protection System (PPS) focuses on control room habitability and safety boundaries.
The agreement also includes Independent Verification and Validation (IV&V) services. This step validates the safety-critical digital protection software for commercial regulatory approval. The HIPS platform features a purpose-built architecture combining analogue-like reliability with modern diagnostics. It provides cybersecurity compliance to meet the strict standards required for next-generation multi-module nuclear facilities.
NuScale said the award marks a significant milestone, as NuScale already has certain components of 12 power modules in production. “We anticipate that nuclear plants that deploy NPMs will feature one common control room that supports up to 12 NuScale Power Modules, each capable of generating up to 77 MWe of clean, carbon-free power.”
John Hopkins, President & CEO of NuScale Power noted: “Paragon has been a valuable technology partner in the development of the HIPS technology, advancing the digital instrumentation and control systems that are essential to safe and reliable plant operations. This partnership helps us to achieve the goal of delivering reliable, carbon-free power to our customers while ensuring the highest level of safety.”
Paragon President & CEO Doug VanTassell said the contract represents the culmination of years of collaboration between Paragon and NuScale. “The work we are doing on MPS, SDIS, and PPS is foundational to bringing the first SMR of its kind into operation, and there is no greater validation of our technology than being entrusted with the safety-critical systems of the most significant new reactor design in a generation.”
NuScale does not build the reactors itself; production is handled by its primary strategic manufacturing partner and investor, Doosan Enerbility (formerly Doosan Heavy Industries & Construction) in South Korea. Doosan has cast and formed the heavy nuclear-grade forging materials required for the primary pressure vessels of the first 12 commercial modules. This includes the heavy-gauge steel shells, upper vessel sections, and lower reactor vessel heads that must withstand extreme operational pressures
The 12 modules currently in production at Doosan Enerbility do not yet have a single, locked-in final deployment address. Instead, they are being manufactured as unallocated, long-lead foundational components. NuScale is building them proactively to seed its global order book and dramatically slash wait times for the first commercial customers who sign final purchase contracts.
This followed the collapse of NuScale’s first major project in the US in November 2023. NuScale and Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS) cancelled the Carbon Free Power Project (CFPP), which was to have featured six NuScale power modules due to a 53% surge in inflation-driven target energy prices. NuScale had already placed orders with Doosan Enerbility for six upper reactor pressure vessels (RPVs), weighing over 2,000 tonnes. Following the CFPP cancellation, NuScale’s leadership decided to maintain and eventually expand its forging backlog with Doosan to a total of 12 modules.
Looking at NuScale’s formal project agreements, these 12 modules are likely to be routed to one of three primary commercial deployment paths.
The largest and most definitive domestic pipeline for NuScale’s 12-module plant layout is an ambitious utility partnership between the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and ENTRA1 Energy, NuScale’s strategic partner. The two companies have a 50/50 joint venture company – ENTRA1 NuScale LLC – under which ENTRA1 holds the global exclusive rights to the commercialisation, distribution, and deployment of NuScale’s products and services.
This project is for 6 GWe of SMR capacity across the US Southeast. Specific sites are being evaluated across TVA’s seven-state territory, which spans across Tennessee and parts of Alabama, Mississippi, Kentucky, Georgia, North Carolina, and Virginia.
NuScale is also progressing its project at the Doicești Power Station, a former coal-fired thermal plant in southern Romania. This project, managed by RoPower Nuclear (a joint venture of Nuclearelectrica and Nova Power & Gas), is designed as a six-module plant (462 MWe).
NuScale is pursuing two other international frameworks structured around the 12-module configuration. In Poland, NuScale has an agreement with KGHM Polska Miedź SA to deploy a VOYGR-12 plant to replace coal power at their industrial processing facilities. In late 2024, NuScale signed an agreement with the government of Ghana and Regnum Technology Group to establish a VOYGR-12 plant configuration.
However, earlier this year NuScale shares fell after analysts at Guggenheim Securities raised concerns about its commercialisation partner ENTRA1 Energy, prompting securities fraud lawsuits and renewed scrutiny of milestone payments and strategic risks. The securities fraud class action lawsuits centre on allegations that the company severely misrepresented the credentials of ENTRA1 Energy. Triggered by the Guggenheim Securities report and devastating quarterly disclosures, multiple law firms filed suits in the Oregon District Court.
NuScale shocked the market by revealing that its general and administrative expenses ballooned by over 3,000% due to a massive $495m payment to ENTRA1 tied to the TVA project. The lawsuits highlight that NuScale failed to properly inform the market of its total future milestone payment exposure under this contract, which potentially exceeds $3bn. Following these revelations and subsequent analyst downgrades, NuScale’s stock fell from its highs above $57 per share to the low teens, erasing billions in market value.
Because NuScale positioned ENTRA1 as its exclusive global commercialisation partner, these legal actions directly threaten the viability of its forward-looking project pipelines. They insert massive execution and regulatory risk into the TVA fleet opportunity with investors questioning whether ENTRA1 has the institutional capacity to deploy and manage large-scale nuclear projects.
