⚛️DOE To Fund $5B for First-of-a-Kind Reactors

Trump just signed H.R. 6938 into law, the “Commerce, Justice, Science; Energy and Water Development; and Interior and Environment Appropriations Act, 2026”.

It’s a monster bill, 168 pages.

Did he read it?
Unclear.

But I read it, and buried inside it is something nuclear fans have been waiting for: roughly $5 billion headed toward civil nuclear development.

The headline number: $3.1 billion for the Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program (ARDP). This is first-of-a-kind (FOAK) money, designed to push projects across the deployment line when private capital alone won’t do it (FOAK you money).

TerraPower’s Natrium and X-energy’s Xe-100 are both part of the program. So are Holtec’s SMR-300, GE Hitachi’s BWRX-300, Westinghouse’s eVinci, and Kairos Power’s Hermes, and more.

Another $1.8 billion is being reallocated from other DOE programs into the Office of Nuclear Energy. Exactly how that gets divided is still an open question.

The bill also sets aside $150 million for loan guarantees, effectively lowering financing risk for SMRs and advanced reactors by backing their debt with the U.S. government.

The only catch, because there’s always a catch: If DOE doesn’t get crystal-clear guidance on priorities, vendors are about to enter the Hunger Games for slices of the nuclear budget pie.

May the odds be ever in your favor.

☀️First Publicly Traded Fusion Company

You know I’m a sucker for the investment side of nuclear, and this week nuclear fusion got a ticker.

Canada’s General Fusion announced it’s going public via a SPAC merger with Spring Valley Acquisition Corp, the same crew that took the SMR company NuScale Power public.

The company plans to trade on Nasdaq mid-2026 as GFUZ, at a $1 billion valuation.

Now, quick reality check before anyone starts emailing me “Fusion will never work“:

No one has a commercially viable fusion plant yet, and General Fusion still has a long way to go: prove the physics, engineer the machine, build the first plant, then live happily ever after.

Their angle is Magnetized Target Fusion (MTF), a mechanical “squeeze” approach that avoids giant superconducting magnets and high-powered laser setups.

They start with a small ball of super-hot plasma, use magnetism to help it hold its heat, then surround it with a swirling layer of liquid metal. Next, pistons slam in and compress the liquid metal, which crushes the plasma for a split second. If the squeeze is strong and fast enough, the fuel gets hot and dense enough for fusion reactions to kick off.

The appeal is that instead of relying on ultra-delicate tech, MTF uses stuff engineers already know how to build at scale: metal, pumps, pistons, pressure vessels.

If you ever wanted a front-row seat to the fusion hype cycle with a live stock chart attached, congrats, you’re about to get one.

🇰🇷 S. Korea Resume Construction of 2 Nuclear Reactors

South Korea’s government just did something politicians rarely do: it looked at the data, then changed its minds.

After putting the brakes on new builds approved under the previous administration, the government is now proceeding with the original plan.

The reason is simple, the public is pro-nuclear. Nearly 90% said nuclear power is necessary and over 60% backed the build plan.

The project includes 2 large reactors totaling 2.8 GW, targeted for completion in 2037 and 2038, plus a 700 MW SMR around 2035.

South Korea have already burned precious time, the large reactors will take roughly 14 years. Even meeting their existing target of around 35% nuclear power by 2038 would require far more construction than currently planned.

Energy policy whiplash doesn’t show up on politicians scorecard, but it shows up in higher energy prices, lower grid reliability, and rushed decisions.

Germany, take notes.

📈 Premium Portfolio Update

The Premium Portfolio just hit an all time high. That means everyone who’s bought into it since launch has made money, even if you joined late or bought in at the top back then.

Want the allocations, live ratings, and what I’m buying, holding, and trimming as the cycle evolves? Join Premium!

Trump: "We’re Very Much Into Nuclear Energy"

From Davos last week, Trump doesn’t dance around it: “We’re going heavy into nuclear.”

Watch the clip👇

☢️ When Camera Lenses Went Nuclear

Welcome back to Atomic Alternatives, where we explore how atoms can do a lot more than generate electricity.

This week’s contender: vintage cameras that were… slightly radioactive.

In the 1940s through the 1970s, some high-end camera lenses were made with glass doped with thorium oxide.
Not as a power source, but as an optical cheat code.

Thorium increases the refractive index of glass, which lets designers make brighter, sharper lenses with less distortion.

For photographers, that meant crisper images. For radiation nerds, it meant consumer products with radioactive material inside.

The radiation is low, mostly alpha particles that don’t travel far. The side effect most people notice is the lens turning yellow over time as radiation changes the crystal structure.

Mid-century engineers were pragmatic. Thorium worked, it was cheap, regulations were loose, and no one thought twice about putting mildly radioactive materials into everyday objects.

Atoms: not just for reactors. Sometimes, they just help you take a really sharp photo.

😂Meme of The Week

Time to do like uranium-235 and split.

See you next week.

-Fredrik

Like the newsletter and want to support it? Join Premium.

📬[email protected]
🌐nuclearupdate.com