NANO Nuclear has received a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I contract from AFWERX to advance its KRONOS MMR Energy System for the Department of the Air Force (DAF). AFWERX is DAF’s innovation arm, functioning as a technology incubator to fast-track commercial technology into the US military. It connects the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) with startups, small businesses, and private investors to solve defence challenges.
The contract focuses on optimising the KRONOS MMR to provide resilient, localised, and zero-carbon baseload power for mission-critical military defence installations. It strengthens NANO Nuclear’s growing relationship with DAF and increases the possibility of future defence deployment opportunities.
The DAF Open Topic SBIR/STTR (Small Business Technology Transfer) programme, launched in 2018, expanded the range of innovations DAF funded by shifting from “Specific Topics” to commercial-first technology solutions. Previously, the military dictated the exact technical specifications it wanted businesses to build. By introducing the Open Topic programme, the Air Force inverted this model. It allowed commercial startups to pitch their existing, cutting-edge products directly to the military.
“This award represents another meaningful step in the continued advancement of NANO Nuclear’s defence commercialisation strategy,” said NANO CEO James Walker. “We now have multiple active engagements with the Department of the Air Force that demonstrate increasing confidence in our technology and technical capabilities. We believe these programmes create valuable opportunities to showcase the KRONOS MMR, while establishing relationships that may support future deployment opportunities across additional Air Force installations and the broader Department of War.”
Jay Yu, Founder and Chairman of NANO Nuclear Energy, noted: “Energy resilience has become a strategic priority across the US military, and advanced microreactors have the potential to fundamentally change how critical installations are powered. This award is significant not only because it expands our opportunity with the Air Force, but because it represents continued commercial validation of our technology roadmap. As we continue executing on each of our Air Force programmes, we believe NANO Nuclear is positioning itself as an emerging participant in what could become one of the most important long-term markets for advanced microreactor deployment.”
The KRONOS MMR Energy System is a high-temperature, gas-cooled microreactor that uses helium coolant and particle fuel. Its compact, modular architecture is intended to support flexible deployment and scalable power output, from single-unit configurations to gigawatt-class multi-reactor clusters capable of powering large industrial and civil campuses as well as other applications, including governmental requirements. It is currently in construction permit pre-application engagement with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) in collaboration with University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Targeted groundbreaking and initial construction are slated to begin in the second half of 2027.
Earlier in July, NANO Nuclear announced progress in a strategic engineering collaboration with engineering and consulting firm Fortil, related to the design of the Fuel Handling & Storage System for the KRONOS MMR. The Fuel Handling & Storage System is a critical subsystem of the KRONOS MMR architecture, supporting the safe handling, storage, and management of nuclear fuel throughout reactor operations.
The collaboration has reached a notable engineering milestone with conceptual design activities near conclusion. This establishes the technical basis for the Fuel Handling & Storage System by evaluating engineering solutions against programme requirements, defining key subsystem interfaces, and producing the engineering documentation that will guide subsequent development activities. Collectively, this work reduces technical risk, supports future first-of-a-kind deployment, and establishes an engineering framework capable of supporting standardised future commercial deployments.
Fortil’s dedicated nuclear division is executing a multidisciplinary design framework to build out the system working across five foundational engineering sectors:
- Mechanical Engineering: Defining the physical mechanisms used to manipulate, insert, and extract nuclear fuel securely.
- Systems Engineering: Mapping how the fuel subsystem physically and digitally connects to the core KRONOS reactor architecture.
- Nuclear Safety: Developing strict failsafe mechanisms to guarantee total containment during normal operation and extreme external events.
- Instrumentation & Control (I&C): Embedding smart automated monitoring sensors to track fuel conditions in real-time.
- Radiation Protection: Designing structural shielding boundaries to eliminate hazard exposure for operators and surroundings.
Completing this concept phase directly lowers technical risk and accelerates the reactor’s broader commercial pathway. It eliminates engineering variables by cross-evaluating solutions against strict program requirements. It creates a highly repeatable, blueprinted framework for future mass commercial manufacturing and builds the rigorous technical documentation required to support the ongoing NRC construction permit review.
