Today, Canadian company Kinectrics announced its plans to design, build and operate a collaborative clean energy innovation campus. Accordingly, the Helius campus will provide the infrastructure needed to support the development, testing, and commercialization of small modular reactors (SMRs). Indeed, Kinectrics will site the facility alongside its existing laboratories in Toronto, Ontario.
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According to the company, the development of advanced SMR designs, including high-temperature gas reactors (HTGR), requires specialized infrastructure. Indeed, this is still not currently available and is needed for testing, large-scale experiments, and modeling.
Kinectrics on developing the Helius campus
Accordingly, Kinectrics will develop this campus aiming to assure performance and technology readiness of reactor components. Besides, to create reliable predictive models for design and safety analysis, amongst other things. Finally, the company aims the project to mitigate technical, schedule, and project risk.
In fact, Helius will gather Canadian academic institutions, industry leaders, SMR developers, and utilities. Additionally, the innovation campus will feature a 10 MW, electrically heated helium test loop. Consequently, this technology will serve to develop, test, and qualify materials, components, and systems used in high-temperature gas reactors.
Similarly, secondary loops will mimic the actual usage of technologies with advanced nuclear reactors. For instance, including thermal energy storage, hydrogen generation, industrial/district heating, and niche applications.
Worth noting, collaboration agreements are in progress with X-energy, U-Battery, Énergie NB Power, and the Nuclear Innovation Institute. Besides, Kinectrics is looking forward to establishing partnerships with universities and Natural Resources Canada.
Reception and Outlook
In this sense, Katherine Moshonas Cole, president of X-energy Canada, said; In fact, “our Xe-100 SMR is a Generation IV HTGR. Thus, Helius will allow us to test the safety and performance requirements of our systems and components in high-temperature environments. The facility will also enable us to demonstrate Xe-100’s high-temperature steam for hydrogen production and direct industrial uses. So, these capabilities are critical for Canada’s plans for a net-zero future.”
Lastly, the Helius campus will include “flexible and adaptable” facilities with collaborative space for R&D, testing, and scale-up of a variety of clean energy technologies; for instance, helium, molten salt, and steam loops with operating temperatures between 200°C and 1100°C.
Finally, Kinectrics President and CEO David Harris said the initiative will help create long-term jobs in Ontario. Besides, it will support the development, testing, and commercialization of SMRs; thus providing the critical infrastructure required to accelerate their introduction worldwide.
