X alumni involved in nuclear start-ups supported by France 2030

At the World Nuclear Exhibition, held from November 28th to 30th, 2023 at the Exhibitions Park in Villepinte, north of Paris, the French Minister for Energy Transition, Agnès Panier-Runacher, announced the six new winners of the "Innovative Nuclear Reactors" call for projects.

As part of this call for projects, launched on March 2nd, 2022 and running until June 28th, 2023, fifteen projects were submitted and the first two winners were annouced on June 9th, 2023.

Of the eight projects supported by the French government as part of the France 2030 Plan, four are co-founded or supported by X alumni.

Naarea, co-founded by Ivan Gavriloff (X81), is behind the XAMR (eXtrasmall Advanced Modular Reactor) project, a 4th-generation nuclear micro-generator capable of producing electricity and heat from used nuclear fuel of exiting nuclear plants. This fast-neutron reactor project, using molten salts as coolant, aims to enable the complete closure of the nuclear fuel cycle.

Jimmy, co-founded in November 2021 by Antoine Guyot (X2013) aims to develop, market and operate an innovative 4th generation high-temperature thermal spectrum microreactor of around 15 MW thermal, for the production of decarbonized industrial heat up to 600°C.

Blue Capsule, co-founded in November 2022 by Alexis Burdeau (MX2005, Master's degree in Liquid Physics) and Alexis Lokhov (BX2000 and PhD at l'X in Theoretical Physics), is developing a 150 MWth high-temperature nuclear reactor based on a sodium coolant. The project couples two mature technologies, to combine for the first time the intrinsically safe fuel of high-temperature nuclear reactors, made up of TRISO microparticles, with high-temperature (over 700°C) liquid sodium as coolant.

Otrera Nuclear Energy (ONE), founded in February 2023 and whose advisory board is chaired by Philippe Pradel (X75), director of nuclear energy at the Commissariat à l'énergie atomique (CEA) from 2005 to 2010, is proposing a sodium-cooled fast-neutron reactor capable of high-efficiency cogeneration (110 MWe, 185 MWth).