Draft:Reactor Pilot Program

• Comment: Was AI used for writing the content within this article? Zalaraz (talk) 12:44, 7 July 2026 (UTC)
• Comment: I believe this article meets notability guidelines, and is generally well written. References seem to check out too. That said, I suspect some kind of automated tool use. The Breakthrough Institute reference cited authors listed in the 'Related Articles' column, implying the citation was scraped. H2so4aq (talk) 18:15, 12 July 2026 (UTC)

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The Reactor Pilot Program (RPP) is a program of the United States Department of Energy (DOE) established in June 2025 to expedite the construction and testing of advanced nuclear reactors in the United States. Under the program, private companies build and operate first-of-a-kind test reactors under DOE authorization pursuant to the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, rather than through the commercial licensing process of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC).

The program was created in response to Executive Order 14301, "Reforming Nuclear Reactor Testing at the Department of Energy," signed by President Donald Trump on May 23, 2025, which set a goal of having at least three test reactors achieve criticality by July 4, 2026. The goal was met: four DOE-authorized reactors reached criticality by the deadline, beginning with Antares Nuclear's Mark-0 on June 4, 2026, and concluding with Aalo Atomics' test reactor in the early hours of July 4, 2026.

Background

Responsibility for civilian nuclear energy in the United States is divided by the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974: the DOE oversees research, development, and demonstration of nuclear technologies, while the NRC regulates commercial nuclear safety and licenses commercial reactors. Prior to the Reactor Pilot Program, developers of advanced reactors faced a gap between small-scale laboratory testing and full NRC-licensed commercial demonstration, with no intermediate pathway for prototyping first-of-a-kind reactor designs.

On May 23, 2025, President Trump signed four executive orders intended to promote nuclear energy development. One of these, Executive Order 14301, directed the DOE to establish an expedited authorization process for advanced reactor testing and set a target of constructing, operating, and achieving criticality in at least three test reactors through the DOE authorization process by July 4, 2026, the 250th anniversary of American independence.

Program structure

The DOE issued a request for applications on June 18, 2025, seeking proposals from qualified companies to construct and operate test reactors at sites outside the national laboratories using the DOE authorization process. Initial applications closed on July 21, 2025, with subsequent applications accepted on a rolling basis. Participating companies are responsible for all costs associated with designing, manufacturing, constructing, operating, and decommissioning their test reactors; the program provides no direct federal funding.

Projects in the program progress through four authorization milestones with the DOE: an other transaction agreement (OTA) formalizing the partnership; a nuclear safety design agreement (NSDA) establishing the safety and regulatory framework; a preliminary documented safety analysis (PDSA) validating the company's safety case; and a documented safety analysis (DSA), which enables final authorization and operation.

The DOE has stated that reactor designs approved through the program can be fast-tracked for future NRC licensing, and the DOE and NRC have signed a memorandum of understanding addendum committing the agencies to coordinate so that NRC licensing reviews of DOE-tested designs focus on new risks rather than revisiting issues already addressed in DOE reviews.

Selected projects

On August 12, 2025, the DOE announced initial selections of 11 projects from 10 companies:

• Aalo Atomics – Aalo-X, a 10 MWe sodium-cooled graphite-moderated reactor at Idaho National Laboratory (INL)
• Antares Nuclear – Mark-0, a zero-power test configuration of its sodium heat pipe-cooled, TRISO-fueled R1 microreactor, at INL
• Atomic Alchemy (later rebranded Oklo Isotopes following its acquisition by Oklo Inc.) – the Groves Isotope Test Reactor, a 15 MWt water-cooled isotope production reactor in Lockhart, Texas
• Deep Fission – a pressurized water borehole reactor designed for deployment roughly one mile underground, in Parsons, Kansas
• Last Energy – PWR-5, a scaled-down pilot of its 20 MWe PWR-20, at Texas A&M University's RELLIS campus
• Natura Resources – MSR-1, a 1 MWt molten salt research reactor with Abilene Christian University
• Oklo Inc. (two projects) – the Aurora-INL, a 75 MWe sodium-cooled fast reactor, and Pluto, a plutonium-fueled fast test reactor developed under a strategic partnership with Battelle
• Radiant Industries – Kaleidos, a 1 MWe helium-cooled, TRISO-fueled microreactor, to be tested at the National Reactor Innovation Center's DOME facility at INL
• Terrestrial Energy – Project Tetra, an Integral Molten Salt Reactor planned for the RELLIS campus
• Valar Atomics – Ward 250, a 100 kWt helium-cooled, TRISO-fueled high-temperature gas-cooled reactor at the Utah San Rafael Energy Lab

Several of the most established advanced reactor developers, including Kairos Power, X-energy, and TerraPower, chose not to participate in the program.

Related programs

Executive Order 14301 also led the DOE to establish the Fuel Line Pilot Program in July 2025, a parallel authorization pathway for building and operating nuclear fuel production lines to supply the test reactors. In September 2025, the DOE conditionally selected Oklo, Terrestrial Energy, TRISO-X, and Valar Atomics for that program.

In March 2026, the DOE extended and expanded the Reactor Pilot Program into a longer-term initiative called the Nuclear Energy Launch Pad, which added new participants including Deployable Energy and NuCube Energy; Radiant Industries was selected for both programs.

Outcomes

Four DOE-authorized reactors achieved zero-power fueled criticality by the July 4, 2026 deadline:

• Antares Nuclear became the first participant to reach the milestone, achieving criticality with its Mark-0 reactor at Idaho National Laboratory on June 4, 2026.
• Valar Atomics reached criticality with its Ward 250 reactor at the Utah San Rafael Energy Lab on June 18, 2026, subsequently conducting a power ascension to 10 kWt and converting the output to electricity.
• Deployable Energy, a participant in the Nuclear Energy Launch Pad, achieved criticality with its 1 MWe gas-cooled Unity microreactor at INL, announced July 1, 2026, approximately 150 days after beginning its project. The DOE described this as the third DOE-authorized reactor criticality fulfilling the executive order's goal.
• Aalo Atomics achieved criticality with its Aalo-X critical test reactor, a full-scale zero-power version of its planned 10 MWe design, at INL at 12:20 a.m. MT on July 4, 2026, approximately eight months after breaking ground. It was the fourth DOE-authorized reactor to reach criticality, exceeding the executive order's target of three.

Other participants continued to progress toward criticality as of July 2026. Oklo Isotopes received DSA approval for its Groves Isotope Test Reactor and planned to achieve criticality in July 2026; Last Energy completed construction of its pilot building at the RELLIS campus and submitted its final DSA for review; and Radiant Industries received its first fuel delivery at INL's DOME facility with plans to progress through criticality to full-power operation over the summer.

Reception

Commentators described the program as a significant experiment in accelerating U.S. nuclear development. Writing in Utility Dive, energy attorney Jocelyn Lavallo argued that the program could unlock private capital and re-establish American leadership in advanced nuclear technology, but warned that bypassing NRC oversight carried a risk that the public could perceive the test reactors as being held to diluted safety standards. Analysts at the Breakthrough Institute wrote that the program addressed a missing prototyping stage in the U.S. nuclear innovation cycle, while identifying unresolved questions including the scope of DOE's statutory authority over reactors "under its control" and whether test reactors authorized under the program fall within the liability framework of the Price-Anderson Act.

Some observers were more critical. The nuclear industry blog Neutron Bytes argued that the July 4 criticality target was a politically motivated milestone that offered participating companies no promise of future funding, and noted that all participants would eventually face the cost and time of NRC licensing to deploy commercially. The Nuclear Innovation Alliance noted that questions remained unresolved regarding commercial electricity sales from DOE-authorized reactors and the terms of compensation under the program's contracting structure.

See also

• Nuclear power in the United States
• Power Reactor Demonstration Program
• Small modular reactor