Oak Ridge Today

Kairos Power begins construction on demonstration reactor​

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Kairos Power has started construction on a test nuclear reactor in west Oak Ridge. The Hermes Low-Power Demonstration Reactor is the first of its type to be approved for construction by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the first non-light-water reactor to be permitted in the U.S. in more than 50 years, a press release said. (Image courtesy Kairos Power)

Kairos Power has started construction on a test nuclear reactor in west Oak Ridge.

The Hermes Low-Power Demonstration Reactor is the first of its type to be approved for construction by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the first non-light-water reactor to be permitted in the U.S. in more than 50 years, a press release said.

The NRC approved a construction permit for the test reactor at Heritage Center industrial park, the former K-25 site, in December.

“Hermes represents a critical milestone on Kairos Power’s iterative path to commercializing advanced reactor technology,” the press release said.

Kairos Power said it has contracted with Barnard Construction Company Inc. to perform sitework and excavation at the Hermes site in Oak Ridge, and that work began earlier this month.

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Crews clean up demolished ORNL reactor

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An aerial view of the site of the Low Intensity Test Reactor after U.S. Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management crews demolished it. Crews have since shipped the reactor vessel and backfilled the pit where the facility had stood. (Photo courtesy UCOR/DOE Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management)

Workers have finished cleaning up after demolishing the Low Intensity Test Reactor at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

The work was done by cleanup contractor UCOR for the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management.

Workers finished the tearing down the Low Intensity Test Reactor and disposing rubble and debris last fall, achieving a federal environmental management priority that year, according to the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management.

“However, the reactor vessel remained on the building’s footprint until it could be shipped for final disposition offsite,” DOE said in its “EM Update” newsletter.

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Almost two miles of pipes replaced at waste treatment systems

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Oak Ridge crews installed approximately 5,500 feet of new piping as part of a project at the Liquid and Gaseous Waste Operations system. The work required 5,000 hours of welding to complete the nearly two miles of welded lines. (Photo courtesy U.S. Department of Energy Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management/UCOR)

Close to two miles of pipes were replaced at waste treatment systems at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

The two-year, $18 million project was completed three months ahead of schedule and $900,000 under budget, according to federal officials. The project replaced above-ground pipes and valves at the 3608 Process Waste Treatment Complex, “making the system more efficient and reliable and helping avoid the possibility of disrupting ongoing ORNL operations,” federal officials said.

The piping replacement was a project of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management and its contractor UCOR. The goal was to extend the life of the Liquid and Gaseous Waste Operations (LGWO) system at ORNL. DOE said the LGWO system is critical to ORNL’s ongoing missions, and an outage would result in immediate impacts at the site.

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ORNL names associate lab director for neutron sciences

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Jens Dilling (Photo courtesy Oak Ridge National Laboratory)

Jens Dilling has been named associate laboratory director for the Neutron Sciences Directorate at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, effective April 1.

“ORNL pioneered neutron scattering in the 1940s, developing a new technique that enables scientists to explore and create new materials, batteries, and more,” ORNL Director Stephen Streiffer said. “Today, ORNL remains at the forefront of this science, and Jens will play a critical role in ensuring the nation’s leading neutron sources continue to deliver significant scientific impact for the United States and the world.”

Dilling has served as interim associate laboratory director for neutron sciences since August 1. He leads more than 700 employees at the High Flux Isotope Reactor and Spallation Neutron Source—two of the most powerful scientific research facilities in the world—as well as in projects focused on improving the lab’s neutron capabilities.

“Dilling demonstrated strong leadership in his interim role and will continue the (Neutron Sciences Directorate) team’s efforts to expand the scientific impact of the lab’s neutron sources while also growing the neutron user community across the United States,” ORNL said.

Neutron scattering uses beams of neutrons (parts of atoms that have no charge) that pass through samples. Detectors collect information about where (and possibly when) the neutrons are scattered to learn more about the materials. The Spallation Neutron Source uses a particle accelerator to send protons (positively charged parts of atoms) to collide with a heavy metal target to produce the neutrons in a process known as spallation. Meanwhile, at the High Flux Isotope Reactor, neutrons are produced by a nuclear reactor.

ORNL said neutron scattering is used in industries that include automotive, aerospace, steel, defense, industrial materials, energy storage, data storage, and biomedicine. Researchers use the process to find stronger glass for mobile devices, drugs that treat diseases more effectively, aircraft and rocket engines that are more reliable, vehicles with better gas mileage, better armor for the military, and batteries that are safer, charge faster, and last longer.

Dilling is an experimental nuclear physicist with “more than 20 years delivering breakthroughs in fundamental and applied nuclear physics,” the lab said. He started at ORNL in 2021, serving as director of Institutional Strategic Planning. In 2023, he took a joint faculty appointment as a research professor in the Department of Physics at Duke University, a core university of UT-Battelle LLC, the partnership that operates ORNL for the U.S. Department of Energy.

Before ORNL, Dilling worked for two decades at TRIUMF, Canada’s national laboratory for accelerator sciences at the University of British Columbia. He started at TRIUMF in 2001 as a research scientist before moving into various leadership positions, concluding his tenure as the associate laboratory director for physical sciences, a press release said.

Dilling earned his undergraduate and doctoral degrees in physics from the University of Heidelberg in Germany. He is a fellow of the American Physical Society, or APS, and received the APS Francis M. Pipkin Award, the Vogt Medal from the Canadian Association of Physicists, or CAP, and the Rutherford Memorial Medal from the Royal Society of Canada for “breakthrough discoveries in the field of experimental nuclear physics studying the fine details of the interactions of the atomic building blocks, the nucleons.” He is a professional member of APS, the German Physical Society, CAP, the Canadian Society for Mass Spectrometry, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

More information will be added as it becomes available.

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Crews prepare to demolish Graphite Reactor support facilities

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An aerial view of a filter house, fan house, and 200-foot-tall exhaust stack that provided support to the Graphite Reactor, which is located about 100 feet away from these facilities. (Photo courtesy U.S. Department of Energy Office of Environmental Management)

Federal cleanup crews are preparing to demolish three support facilities for the historic Graphite Reactor at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

The demolition of the support facilities is planned for next year.

The deactivation work at the three facilities is being done by UCOR, a cleanup contractor for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management.

The buildings include the filter house, or Building 3002; fan house, or Building 3003; and exhaust stack, or Building 3018. They were previously used to filter and release exhaust from Graphite Reactor operations.

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ORNL employees, contractor give about $1 million to nonprofits

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Oak Ridge National Laboratory materials clerk Julie Givens talks to ORNL Director Stephen Streiffer at the drop-off for Angel Tree gifts. ){Photo credit: ORNL/U.S. Department of Energy)

Employees of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory donated more than $828,000 to local nonprofits through the lab’s employee giving programs in 2023, a press release said.

ORNL’s managing contractor, UT-Battelle, provided an additional $139,600 in support of employee efforts, bringing the total to more than $967,000.

In addition, ORNL employees recorded more than 1,497 volunteer hours while serving 56 nonprofits, the press release said. With the value of these volunteer hours estimated at $36,232, total employee-led contributions for 2023 were valued at more than $1 million.

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Winter weather: Closings, cancellations, delays

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Photos courtesy Oak Ridge Schools/ Isaac Walton, transportation supervisor, and Allen Thacker, supervisor of maintenance and operations

Oak Ridge Schools will be closed again on Monday due to unsafe road conditions, and City of Oak Ridge offices will open three hours late.

The schools were closed four days after the holiday last week due to the winter weather, as were many other schools, offices, and businesses. Some roads were also briefly closed. The winter weather has included more than eight inches of snow, freezing temperatures, below-zero wind chills, and slippery roads and sidewalks.

On Sunday, the Oak Ridge Police Department and City of Oak Ridge said many roadways were still very icy despite being treated and plowed.

“Conditions are expected to worsen once the sun goes down,” they said. “Stay home, if possible.”

The schools said temperatures are projected to warm on Monday.

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ORNL, city offices & facilities closed Tuesday

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Snow falls at Weigels on South Illinois Avenue at about lunchtime Monday, Jan. 15, 2024. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)

City of Oak Ridge offices and facilities and Oak Ridge National Laboratory will be closed Tuesday due to winter weather.

The city said only essential employees are expected to report to work. The Oak Ridge City Council work session scheduled for Tuesday will be postponed and a new date published later.

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Lunch with League: Global warming at a local level

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Melissa Allen-Dumas

A research scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory on Tuesday will discuss the expected impacts of climate change on extreme weather and cities.

Melissa Allen-Dumas is a research scientist in the Computational Sciences and Engineering Division of Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Her talk at Lunch with the League is scheduled from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Tuesday at the Oak Ridge Unitarian Universalist Church at 809 Oak Ridge Turnpike. Those who attend can bring a lunch or purchase a boxed lunch. Coffee and tea will be served. The presentation will begin at noon, a press release said.

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SNS on hiatus for upgrade

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Construction is under way for the Proton Power Upgrade at Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Spallation Neutron Source. (Photo credit: Brett Riffert/ORNL, U.S. Department of Energy)

The Spallation Neutron Source at Oak Ridge National Laboratory—already the world’s most powerful accelerator-based neutron source—will be on a planned hiatus through June 2024 as crews work to upgrade the facility.

Much of the work—part of the facility’s Proton Power Upgrade project—will involve building a connector between the accelerator and the planned Second Target Station at SNS, a press release said. When complete, the PPU project will bring the accelerator up to 2.8 megawatts from its current record-breaking 1.7 megawatts of beam power.

Workers will add about 3,000 square feet of concrete tunnel, the “stub,” which will integrate with an existing tunnel. Construction tasks include associated structures, roofing, geomembrane liner, tunnel waterproofing, electrical, fire alarm, ventilation systems, and controls.

“The construction crews have performed all of the excavation work and are transitioning to tunnel base and wall construction,” said ORNL’s Mark Champion, PPU project manager.

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Sholl named interim executive director of UT-Oak Ridge Innovation Institute

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David Sholl will serve as interim executive director of the UT-Oak Ridge Innovation Institute. (Photo credit: Genevieve Martin/ORNL, U.S. Department of Energy)

David Sholl, director of the Transformational Decarbonization Initiative at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has been appointed interim executive director of the University of Tennessee-Oak Ridge Innovation Institute. His appointment was effective Monday, June 12.

“Sholl’s background, passion, and expertise will ensure continued progress as the institute recruits exemplary joint research faculty, builds its research portfolio, develops students and prepares them to become leaders, and contributes to workforce development in areas important to Tennessee,” a press release said.

“The work UT faculty and students are doing in partnership with ORNL researchers is advancing the frontiers of knowledge and strengthening Tennessee’s leadership role in areas like clean energy, future mobility, advanced materials, and next-generation manufacturing,” said UT Chancellor Donde Plowman. “We look forward to working with David and to leveraging our strategic partnership with ORNL to advance discoveries, learning, and innovations that make life and lives better here in Tennessee and around the world.”

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ORNL scientist to lead project studying permafrost thaw, climate processes in Alaska

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Colleen Iversen (Photo submitted by ORNL)

Submitted

Colleen Iversen—ecosystem ecologist, group leader, and distinguished staff scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory—has been named director of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Next-Generation Ecosystem Experiments Arctic, or NGEE Arctic. That is a multi-institutional project studying permafrost thaw and other climate-related processes in Alaska, a press release said.

Iversen has worked as a scientist on NGEE Arctic since 2012 and served as its deputy director from 2021-2023. She also leads a research team in the Plant-Soil Interactions Group at ORNL. Iversen succeeds Stan Wullschleger, founding director of NGEE Arctic, who retired as associate laboratory director for Biological and Environmental Systems Science at ORNL in April 2023.

Iversen, who took on the role of director and principal investigator for NGEE Arctic earlier this year, is excited about taking the reins of such a large, multidisciplinary project, the press release said.

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