The US Department of Energy (DOE) has announced the next steps in the Trump administration’s efforts to strengthen domestic supply chains for nuclear fuel. DOE has conditionally selected Standard Nuclear (Oak Ridge, Tennessee) as the first US company accepted into the Fuel Line Pilot Program, announced in July. The initiative, issued in accordance with President Trump’s Executive Order Deploying Advanced Nuclear Reactors for National Security seeks to eliminate US reliance on foreign sources of enriched uranium and critical materials while opening the door for private sector investment in America’s nuclear renaissance. DOE issued a Request for Application on 15 July from qualified US companies to build and operate nuclear fuel production lines using the DOE authorisation process.
In June DOE established a pilot programme for reactor construction and operation on sites located outside of the national laboratories in accordance with Executive Order 14301 to reform and streamline national laboratory processes for reactor testing at DOE. The US currently lacks the sufficient domestic nuclear fuel resources to meet projected demand and DOE is relying on the same authority to develop or build fuel production lines to increase production capacity under Executive Order 14299 to deploy advanced nuclear reactor technologies for national security.
The Fuel Line Pilot Program supports the Reactor Pilot Program that aims to have at least three advanced reactor designs achieve criticality by 4 July 2026 and establishes a domestic nuclear fuel supply chain for testing new reactors. The programme leverages DOE authorisation process to build and operate nuclear fuel production lines to serve for research, development, and demonstration purposes and to provide a fast-tracked approach to commercial licensing.
“With President Trump’s leadership, the Energy Department is moving at a rapid pace to unleash innovation and maintain American leadership in nuclear energy development,” said Secretary of Energy Chris Wright. “Advanced nuclear reactors will be a game-changer for the United States, and with that comes the need to fabricate the fuel for these reactors. The Department of Energy is partnering private sector innovation with DOE expertise to assure stronger US nuclear supply lines.”
Standard Nuclear has emerged from stealth following a funding round that raised $42m to develop advanced nuclear fuel. The funding round was led by Decisive Point with participation from Andreessen Horowitz, Crucible Capital, Fundomo, and Washington Harbour Partners.
Standard Nuclear is built on assets purchased at auction following the bankruptcy of the Ultra Safe Nuclear Corporation (USNC) for $28m. Standard CEO, Kurt Terrani, previously served as Vice President at USNC. Standard Nuclear says it has $100m in non-binding fuel sales for 2027, and that it is working with customers including Nano Nuclear Energy, which acquired other USNC assets in the bankruptcy auction, and Radiant Industries, another Decisive Point portfolio company.
USNC had been working to commercialise TRISO (TRIstructural-ISOtropic) nuclear fuel. TRISO refers to a specific design of uranium nuclear reactor fuel. TRIstructural refers to the layers of carbon- and ceramic-based coatings surrounding the uranium fuel. ISOtropic refers to the coatings having uniform materials characteristics in all directions so that fission products are retained. A number of advanced reactor designs intend to use TRISO fuel.
Standard Nuclear will leverage the DOE authorisation process to ensure a robust supply of nuclear fuel in both Tennessee and Idaho. Advanced fuel is in high demand as reactor developers get ready to test designs that utilise TRISO fuel. Standard Nuclear will be responsible for all costs associated with the construction operation, and decommissioning of the facility. Reactor project developers will manage the sourcing of nuclear material feedstock for fuel fabrication, which could be acquired through DOE’s high-assay low-enriched uranium allocation programme.
