The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has approved the instrumentation & control (I&C) platform for Westinghouse Electric Company’s eVinci microreactor. NRC approved the eVinci Advanced Logic System (ALS) Version 2 (v2) I&C platform through a Final Safety Evaluation Report on two topical reports. Westinghouse said the eVinci microreactor “is now the first and only microreactor with an NRC-approved I&C system, opening a path to autonomous operation”.
Westinghouse says ALS v2 is a universal, logic-based platform that controls safety-critical systems using hardware instead of software or a computer chip. This approach minimises the need for operator oversight allowing for more automation and greater safety. In addition, the approvals allow the ALS v2 control system to be used by any reactor currently in the US fleet.
Jon Ball, President of eVinci Technologies at Westinghouse, said: “This will advance our future goal of autonomous operation, as the eVinci control system minimises operator input, even during operations like load-following.”
In September, Westinghouse completed the front-end engineering & experiment design (FEEED) phase to test a prototype of eVinci at Idaho National Laboratory (INL). The FEEED process is intended to support developers in design and planning for the fabrication, construction, and potential testing of fuelled reactor experiments at the DOME test bed operated by DOE’s National Reactor Innovation Center (NRIC) at INL. The facility is currently being renovated at the former EBR-II containment structure at INL to help lower the risk of developing new reactor technologies.
Westinghouse was one of three companies competitively selected last year to complete the FEEED process, which includes developing a detailed schedule, budget, design, and test plan for the experiment, as well as a detailed preliminary safety report on its design to ensure safe operations during testing. The eVinci is one of three designs that could potentially start testing at INL’s microreactor test bed as early as 2026.
The eVinci microreactor design is a heatpipe-cooled transportable reactor that will be fully factory built, fuelled and assembled, and capable of delivering combined heat (up to 13 MWt) and power (up to 5 MWe). Its small size allows for standard transportation methods and rapid, on-site deployment, with superior reliability and minimal maintenance. It will use TRISO (TRI-structural ISOtropic) nuclear fuel. It is one of several advanced reactor designs being supported by the US Department of Energy (DOE) Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program (ARDP) intended to accelerate the development and deployment of new reactor technologies.
