Wednesday, 12 March 2025
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The signing ceremony was attended by Chung Kisun, Executive Vice Chairman of HD Hyundai; Won Kwang-shik, Head of Marine Energy Business Division at HD Hyundai Heavy Industries; Bill Gates, founder and chairman of TerraPower; Chris Levesque, president and CEO of TerraPower; and other officials.
The agreement combines HD Hyundai’s manufacturing expertise with TerraPower’s cutting-edge reactor technology, and will build new supply chain capacity to enable large-scale production and global deployment of Natrium plants.
The agreement with HD Hyundai Heavy Industries – an affiliate of HD Hyundai specialising in shipbuilding – creates the manufacturing foundation necessary for full-scale commercialisation beyond the initial demonstration project that is currently under development. In particular, HD Hyundai will develop optimised manufacturing processes to supply key Natrium reactor components.
This partnership builds upon the relationship established in 2024 when HD Hyundai Heavy Industries was competitively selected by TerraPower to develop the cylindrical reactor vessel to be installed in the first Natrium reactor.
“TerraPower is committed to delivering our first Natrium plant in the United States, as well as rapidly deploying additional units at competitive prices during the next decade in the US and around the world,” said TerraPower’s Levesque. “The Natrium technology provides crucial baseload power plus gigawatt-scale energy storage; these plants will provide reliable and flexible power to address growing energy demand. HD Hyundai Heavy Industries’ manufacturing capabilities are world-renowned, and I look forward to working with them to establish the commercial-scale production capacity that will be essential for successful deployment of multiple Natrium units globally.”
Won added: “We expect that HD Hyundai’s extensive experience and advanced technological capabilities in manufacturing will help build the foundation for commercialisation of Natrium reactors. Based on this cooperation, we will accelerate the commercialisation of next-generation nuclear energy solutions and create new growth opportunities in the global SMR market.”
Natrium technology features a 345 MWe sodium-cooled fast reactor using high-assay low-enriched uranium fuel, with a molten salt-based energy storage system that can boost the system’s output to 500 MWe for more than five and a half hours when needed.
TerraPower is the first and only advanced nuclear developer with a permit application for a commercial advanced reactor submitted to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. That application was submitted in March 2024 and is on track for approval in December 2026.
TerraPower is constructing the Natrium demonstration plant near a retiring coal facility at Kemmerer in Wyoming. A ground-breaking ceremony held in June last year marked the start of non-nuclear construction at the site. Nuclear construction will begin after the application is approved: the company is eyeing the start of work on the nuclear island in 2026.
