07.06.2024

The SMR Alliance has revealed its roadmap to early 2025.

At its General Assembly, the SMR Industrial Alliance set a work plan for the remainder of 2024, creating eight working groups to achieve the goals, reports Euractiv.

The SMR Alliance, a collection of public and private actors supported by the European Commission, wants to develop a European system for small nuclear modular reactors (SMR) and advanced nuclear modular reactors (AMR).

These next-generation reactors have a power output of between 200 and 300 megawatts. They can be used for a variety of applications, from generating electricity or heat for industrial or public applications, to replacing coal-fired power plants.

The alliance hopes the first projects will be operational in the first half of 2030 – perhaps sooner – allowing the technology to contribute to reducing greenhouse gas emissions in Europe. These reactors will also contribute to the target of 50 gigawatts (GW) of additional nuclear capacity by 2050 set by pro-nuclear EU member states.

Working groups and next steps

The alliance has 277 members, all based in Europe, divided into different working groups. After the General Assembly, eight Technical Working Groups (TWGs) are now chaired by European companies. They focus on a range of areas from supply chains to research, community engagement, skills and waste management.

Working groups on research, supply chain, skills and finance will start work in June. The rest will start work in October.

"The next important step is to define a technology roadmap ready for the end of the year," said Andrej Goitsea, policy director at Nuclear Europe, a European nuclear association and member of the alliance's steering committee

There are currently 24 different SMR designs listed, 14 of which are AMR. The main objective is to prepare an overall action plan for the first quarter of 2025, structured around ten tasks, including objectives to be achieved, activities to be carried out and products to be delivered.

"At the moment, the work to be done is not yet fully defined," explained NuclearEurope President Yves Debazey.

At the same time, the chairman of the Sustainable Nuclear Energy Technology Platform (SNETP), Bernard Salha, also a member of the alliance's steering committee, announced that any project selected for support would potentially be able to participate in an important project of common European interest. This mechanism allows participants to circumvent some EU state aid rules.

Meanwhile, the first meeting of the governing board, made up of EU member states and the European Group of Nuclear Safety Regulators, will be held in early July.