NERS News

Once derided as “forever 30 years away,” fusion energy has a new swagger. Will it last?

INL, along with Argonne National Laboratory, Northwestern University and the University of Michigan, will support MachH2 by providing the technoeconomic and life cycle analyses of the hydrogen hub.

The NSF-supported facility at U-M is about to begin welcoming researchers to study extreme physics that could advance medicine, microelectronics and more.

The U.S. Department of Energy is giving a Michigan-backed clean hydrogen hub project up to $1 billion to develop regional supply chains for the production, distribution and use of hydrogen in trucks and heavy-duty vehicles, officials said Friday.Chair Todd Allen is quoted.

Michigan is home to three of the world’s 400-some nuclear power stations. When all three are up and running, Michigan gets about 30% of its energy from nuclear sources. Chair Todd Allen discusses.

Japan has started a controversial practice of releasing treated wastewater from the Fukishima nuclear plant today to get rid of the hundreds of millions of gallons being stored on site. Prof. John Lee discusses.

Reopening a modernized Palisades would revitalize the state’s grid with reliable clean energy for decades to come.

U-M received $7.5 million from the U.S. Department of Energy, which in June funded 68 nuclear energy projects with grants totaling more than $56 million. The projects support the development of nuclear technology, early career faculty research and student research at universities and a national laboratory.

In a chilling, existential, bizarrely comic moment, the new movie “Oppenheimer” revives an old question: Did Manhattan Project scientists think there was even a minute possibility that detonating the first atomic bomb on the remote plains of New Mexico could destroy the world? NERS Prof. Aditi Verma is quoted.

Kushner was named the William P. Allis Distinguished University Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

The United Nations’ nuclear watchdog said that a two-year review showed Japan’s plans to release treated wastewater from the Fukushima nuclear plant into the sea were consistent with global safety standards. The amount of risk involved is very minimal and inconsequential, said some observers. Prof. John Lee shares more.

Two Centers of Excellence for studying basic science surrounding how hot plasmas behave, funded by the National Nuclear Security Administration, have been awarded to NERS professors Carolyn Kuranz and Ryan McBride.

The United States is returning the favor regarding the sharing of nuclear data after Russia suspended its participation in the New START Treaty last month. NERS prof. Sara Pozzi is quoted.

The Biden administration envisions dozens of ‘modular’ nuclear plants sprouting across the country. Why coal communities are so eager to be the staging ground for the risky endeavor. Fastest Path to Zero Lead Data Analyst Gabrielle Hoelzle is quoted.

American scientists have announced what they have called a major breakthrough in a long-elusive goal of creating energy from nuclear fusion. NERS prof. Carolyn Kuranz is quoted.

Scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California have managed to get more energy out of a nuclear fusion reaction than they put in to trigger it. NERS Chair Todd Allen is quoted.

Scientists with the U.S. Department of Energy have reached a breakthrough in nuclear fusion. NERS prof. Ryan McBride is quoted.

More than 2,000 feet underground in Carlsbad, New Mexico, sits the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP). NERS prof. Aditi Verma is quoted.

In the race to decarbonize the world’s energy mix, solar panels, wind turbines and batteries have taken center stage. NERS Chair Todd Allen is quoted.

John Foster’s group is developing a plasma-device for disinfecting water on-demand that will be solar- or human-powered.

Nuclear submarines might provide rogue nations with a path to nuclear weapons. But neutrinos could help reveal attempts to go from boats to bombs. NERS prof. Igor Jovanovic is quoted.