{"id":216,"date":"2025-10-14T00:30:09","date_gmt":"2025-10-14T00:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/216\/"},"modified":"2025-10-14T00:30:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-14T00:30:09","slug":"california-nuclear-startup-to-build-reactor-plant-at-tennessee-manhattan-project-site","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/216\/","title":{"rendered":"California nuclear startup to build reactor plant at Tennessee Manhattan Project site"},"content":{"rendered":"

What was once the site of uranium enrichment facilities used for the Manhattan Project<\/a> is now set to become the site of the world\u2019s first mass-produced nuclear<\/a> reactor.\u00a0<\/p>\n

California nuclear<\/a> startup Radiant Industries announced on Monday that it would be building its first factory to mass produce micro-reactors in Oak Ridge, Tennessee<\/a>, encompassing parts of two historic Manhattan Project sites<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The sites, K-27 and K-29, were home to 1940s uranium enrichment buildings<\/a> that were a part of the Oak Ridge Gaseous Diffusion Plant \u2014 one of several facilities across the country that were used to help advance the development of the world\u2019s first atomic bombs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Tennessee facility stopped production in the late 1980s, and the K-27 and K-29 sites were demolished in 2016 and 2006, respectively.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Radiant said it plans to bring nuclear technology back to the area within the next five years, and expects to break ground in early 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat was formerly the first Manhattan Project site will now be the site of the first portable nuclear generator production,\u201d Radiant CEO and founder Doug Bernauer said<\/a> in a statement. \u201cBy 2028, we\u2019ll be rolling out the first factory-built nuclear generator, and within a few years we\u2019ll be producing over a dozen per year.\u201d<\/p>\n

The company also hopes to test its first reactor sometime next year.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The announcement comes just a few months after the startup revealed that it raised $165 million to complete its design for a 1 megawatt \u201cmicro reactor,\u201d bringing its total funding for the project to $225 million.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Radiant\u2019s Kaleidos micro-reactor is intended to replace diesel generators at locations like military sites, remote villages, or even large data centers for three to five years, with rapid installation.<\/p>\n

The startup is one of several companies across the U.S. seeking to prove that small, advanced nuclear reactors can be built more quickly and effectively than traditional large reactors \u2014 offering a solution to Big Tech and others looking to secure reliable power, and fast.\u00a0<\/p>\n

However, like most of those other firms, Radiant faces an uphill regulatory battle.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The California startup has yet to receive approval from federal regulators, who have only approved designs for two small modular reactors, both of which are set to be built by the same company, NuScale.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Still, given support from the Trump administration, tech industries, and th<\/a>e general public for building out nuclear energy in the U.S., companies like Radiant are riding the momentum that many nuclear advocates hope will quicken the regulatory process.\u00a0<\/p>\n

NEARLY 50-YEAR-OLD LAW HAMSTRINGS NUCLEAR ENERGY IN CALIFORNIA<\/a><\/p>\n

Radiant has said the facility will be the first in the world to mass-produce nuclear reactors.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe chose Oak Ridge, Tennessee, because of their strong workforce, the community\u2019s rich nuclear heritage and the public\u2019s second-to-none nuclear IQ,\u201d Tori Shivanandan, Radiant COO, said. \u201cJust as importantly, the state\u2019s business-friendly environment gave us the immediate regulatory certainty we needed to move fast and be up and running to meet growing customer demand for our nuclear generators. We\u2019re excited to start building in just a few months.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"What was once the site of uranium enrichment facilities used for the Manhattan Project is now set to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":217,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[284,75,84,83,9,24,285,286,63,282,287],"class_list":{"0":"post-216","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-manhattan","8":"tag-energy-and-environment","9":"tag-manhattan","10":"tag-manhattan-headlines","11":"tag-manhattan-news","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-city","14":"tag-nuclear-energy","15":"tag-nuclear-power","16":"tag-nyc","17":"tag-technology","18":"tag-tennessee"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}