Opportunities for international collaboration on Modular High Temperature Reactors

This paper assesses potential opportunities for international collaboration with the East Asia countries of Japan, the Republic of Korea (ROK), and China on deployment and commercialization of Modular High Temperature Reactors (MHRs). All three countries have established MHR programs and could provide strong contributions in all phases of design and technology development for deployment of a commercial-scale MHR demonstration module and first-of-a-kind (FOAK) plant to support follow-on commercialization. In the case of Japan and the ROK, government institutions and industries in both countries have previously collaborated at a high level with their counterpart U.S. government institutions and industries on MHR design and technology development, including participation in the Next Generation Nuclear Plant (NGNP) Project sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). For this reason, and because China is well into the construction phase of its commercial-scale, pebble-bed core HTR-PM demonstration plant, most of the material presented in this paper is focused on potential opportunities with Japan and the ROK for demonstration of a MHR with a fixed block-type core. Opportunities for MHR collaboration with Europe are also discussed. (author)