BAR NUNN — A California-based company introduced its plan to build small, portable nuclear reactors and store spent nuclear fuel in Wyoming to a curious crowd of about 120 people Tuesday night.
Locals seemed receptive to building the micro nuclear reactors there, but were more concerned about the spent nuclear fuel coming back to stay.
Radiant Industries Inc. presented its proposed plans for the roughly 350,000-square-foot facility it hopes to start building near Barn Nunn next year and complete by 2028.
Radiant Director of Operations Matt Wilson said the company has decided Wyoming is the best place to be for budding nuclear development, and Bar Nunn is its No. 1 choice to build a plant.
Radiant already has a letter of intent to buy a 130-acre plot of land in Natrona County and hopes to close on the land this summer.
“We’re really impressed and excited to be a part of this community should you all think we’re a good fit as well,” Wilson said.
Wilson told Cowboy State Daily after the meeting the company is planning to move forward with the project in Bar Nunn barring any hijinks with approvals.
“If we’re hearing serious concerns (from the public), we’ll do our best to try and address and alleviate those concerns,” he said.
The biggest hurdle the company must overcome to build its micro nuclear reactors is approval from the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), a process it's engaging in.
If the project goes forward, it could provide significant economic opportunity for Bar Nunn and Natrona County, projected to create as many as 250 jobs when operating at full capacity.
The town hall remained civil throughout, but many residents expressed concern about what the facility could mean for the future of their community.
The reactors themselves would operate off-site after being sold, but the spent fuel would start being returned to the Bar Nunn site by the mid-2030s. The half-life of radioactive fuel is hundreds of thousands of years.
State Sens. Bob Ide, R-Casper, Ed Cooper, R-Ten Sleep; and Reps. Bill Allemand, R-Midwest, J.R. Riggins, R-Casper, Elissa Campbell, R-Casper, Jayme Lien, R-Casper, Tony Locke, R-Casper, Lloyd Larsen, R-Lander, Kevin Campbell, R-Casper, were all in attendance Tuesday.
About That Spent Fuel
Although construction of the reactors didn’t draw much concern from the audience, storing spent nuclear fuel did.
Wilson said it’s “ambiguous” whether that would be legal under Wyoming law as the current law only addresses spent fuel for facilities that generate electricity.
Legislation was created during the most recent session to try and clarify this, but it died before passing into law.
Larsen told Cowboy State Daily he’s optimistic that the Legislature can clarify this issue in the near future.
“I think as people come to understand the project, to understand the type of fuel that’s used, the amount of fuel that’s stored, the safety factors, that they’ll come to having the same level of comfort that I do,” Larsen said.
Tuesday’s town hall was the first time Radiant has publicly engaged with the community of Bar Nunn despite working on the project for months and beginning to consider Wyoming for its project at least one year ago.
Allemand described the town of Bar Nunn, which he represents, as “Mayberry.” He implored the audience “to leave the pitchforks at home.”
“I believe Radiant could bring us some very good things, but we’ve got to be careful about how they come to us,” he said.
Allemand told Cowboy State Daily after the meeting that although he’s unsure if the majority of people in attendance Tuesday support the project, they are willing to learn about it.
The dynamic of Tuesday’s town hall was a sharp contrast to divisive town halls U.S. Rep. Harriet Hageman has been recently hosting that led to the meetings being closed to in-person access.
Concerns
A period of five years would separate the sale of the reactors and the return of spent fuel.
The fuel would be removed from the reactors and placed in large steel canisters, sizing 12 feet wide and 15 feet tall. Once sealed, the canister would go inside a large concrete cavern at the Bar Nunn facility that would be missile- and tornado-proof.
“This fuel will not be interned here for eternity,” Radiant Director of Nuclear Engineering Ben Betzler said.
Betzler said Radiant is also interested in consolidating the spent fuel at another location in the future in a commercial national repository of sorts. That kind of proposal has been talked about for decades but has yet to reach approval.
There has been an extensive list of reported leaks from the same type of “dry cask” containers reported in other states that would come to Wyoming.
Casper resident Rozmaring Czaban and others also expressed deep concerns about the Wyoming facility becoming a national repository for spent nuclear fuel. The one national nuclear waste repository, Yucca Mountain in Nevada, has never gone into operation.
“I think I love Radiant as long as they don’t store waste from other locations out-of-state in ours,” Allemand said.
For Wyoming to become a repository like this, it would take an act of Congress.
Nuclear Engineer River Bennett said the company’s ability to acquire NRC licensing is based on the safety of its storage.
Wilson, who’s planning to move to Wyoming with his family, stressed that in a worst-case meltdown-type scenario “wouldn’t be that bad” because of the small size of the reactors.
“In whatever worst case scenario you’re picturing in your head, the radiation piece of it really isn’t that bad,” he said. “Just given our size and all the safety elements that go into our overall design.”
Tori Shivanandan, Radiant’s chief operating officer, said the company’s insurance policy also includes responsibility for all remediation costs and spent fuel. If the company had to remove its casts, she said this would be an easy task. Radiant also hopes to reuse its fuel.
The project will not require any Wyoming money, but Wilson said the company has been in conversations with the Wyoming Business Council about getting a $25 million grant to help build infrastructure for the facility. Shivanandan said securing this money will be a major part of the project, but Wilson clarified that Radiant will move forward in Bar Nunn whether or not they receive the grant.
The use of this grant drew Ide and Czaban’s irritation, as they don’t believe it’s an appropriate use of public dollars.
Shivanandan also referred on multiple occasions to a significant insurance policy the company must hold in order to run its operations, which includes paying for all land remediation costs. She expressed confusion when asked about developing a safety plan for the facility.
Bar Nunn resident Kimberly Zahara questioned how the project will benefit the town and pointed out how the company will help the county’s tax base, not Bar Nunn’s, since it would be located on county land and pay property taxes to that entity.
Kevin Campbell asked what the company plans to do to protect the reactors from natural elements while traveling through Wyoming.
Bennett said everyone of these scenarios has to be thought through in order to get NSRC approval. He also said the company could limit its shipping to the summer. Shivanandan also said the reactors will be turned off while being transported in large containers, which are surrounded by several layers of intensive containers.
What’s It About?
Shivanandan told the audience they should separate Radiant’s project from other nuclear efforts in Wyoming, and described their work as “multi-generational.”
Radiant is designing prototypes to manufacture and assemble portable micro nuclear reactors that would be constructed and shipped out from its facility in Bar Nunn.
The company plans to start testing its nuclear reactor prototype at the Idaho National Laboratories in early 2026. The goal of the company would be to start construction by the end of 2026 and begin production by 2028.
Radiant plans to sell each reactor for $30 million, and draw $50 million of total revenue off each reactor over its lifetime. The company hopes to sell 50 units per year.
The reactors would be trucked to Cheyenne and then flown out from there.
Shivanandan said the company has already put many hours on its helium circulator and will essentially try to break in the product at the National Laboratories. They hope to achieve a six-week timeline from time of purchase to product delivery.
The tiny power plants that are the size of a shipping container could be used anywhere from mining operations in Wyoming and drilling for energy along the North Slope of Alaska, to powering a huge military radar dish or electrifying a large subdivision of homes.
The reactors themselves don’t use water and rely on helium gas — an amount equal to about seven balloons per reactor — as a coolant because the gas cannot become radioactive. They’ll also tap into ambient air for additional cooling purposes. Radiant Nuclear Engineer River Bennett said the reactors will be able to cool themselves off in all temperatures.
There were multiple similar projects in the 1970s, but Bennett said the technology went dormant in a commercial sense until a few years ago when China started pursuing the technology.
Small But Powerful
Radiant is looking to build 1 megawatt nuclear reactors in Bar Nunn, designed to fit inside shipping containers. One megawatt of electricity equals 1 million watts or 1,000 kilowatts, roughly enough power for the instantaneous demand of 750 homes at once.
A huge benefit of the technology is to be able to avoid shipping military diesel fuel containers, which can easily be targeted by foreign adversaries. Radiant has already been chosen as a finalist to provide four reactor units at the Fort Bragg Army base in North Carolina.
Shivanandan, said the vision for her company is as broad as serving America’s future.
“We want to return the production of nuclear reactors to American soil,” she said.
She also said Radiant wants to use uranium mined in Wyoming to power its reactors, and to use an entirely American-made product. Shivanandan said the vast majority of Radiant’s funding is from American investors like Chevron, and the company must have 95% of its funding come domestically in order to get a Department of Defense security clearance.
After considering more than 50 potential sites in 14 states, Shivanandan said the company faced no rejections.
If prototyping is successful, Shivanandan said the company plans to invest $250 million to $500 million into the project.
Bar Nunn Mayor Peter Boyer said the company may increase local property values and indicated he supports the project.
Radiant would plan to start with 75 employees once first operational and eventually work up to a staff of 250 by 2035.
Radiant Senior Operations Manager Makai Cartman believes this workforce already exists in Wyoming and could be tapped from graduates of Casper College. Shivanandan said the company has already engaged with Casper College and local high schools, and plans to invest in these entities to help develop a workforce, which she said the vast majority will be made up of Wyomingites.
“Nuclear is definitely a field that pays well and something we’d like to extend to the community,” Cartman said.
Wilson said there’s a risk with any new business that opens in a community, but stressed the jobs and financial investment the company will bring to the community. Josh Dorrell, CEO of the Wyoming Business Council agreed and said the economic impact of bringing 250 jobs to Bar Nunn will be huge.
Why Wyoming?
Casper resident Eric Paulson commended the company for hosting the town hall but questioned Radiant staff on how they plan to embrace Wyoming values and enrich the community. Multiple others asked pointedly why the California company has chosen Wyoming for the project.
Casper resident Frank Rheaume was more pointed and expressed concern about the company coming to town and why it wants to relocate to Wyoming from California.
As a relatively new company, Shivanandan said Wyoming’s low regulatory burdens and pro-energy politics make the Cowboy State a great location.
In contrast, she said Radiant didn’t even consider building a facility in its home state of California. Other factors were involved as well, she said, such as access to railroads and low taxes.
Cartman said the facility would be designed in a campus-style with 350,000 total square feet of building space split up between an office, warehouse and nuclear activities. A few acres would also be dedicated to spent nuclear fuel, and would serve up to 200 reactors a year by the 2040s.
Leo Wolfson can be reached at leo@cowboystatedaily.com.
