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MU receives grant for nuclear reactor research

Francis Quadrangle on the MU campus
KBIA
Francis Quadrangle on the MU campus

The Curators of the University of Missouri received a $1.8 million federal grant that will support research related to the production of small nuclear reactors (SMRs) at Ameren’s Callaway County plant in Fulton.

The money came from a fund to create new jobs. MU is partnering with Ameren Missouri and Westinghouse on this project. Director of Business Research and Development Group Dave Schmidt says the final objective of the project with the grant money is to "create a supply chain that is functional and efficient and effective for the project. And that that supply chain would be able to do other kinds of things for other industries."

MU applied for the grant because it wanted to be able to provide technical assistance and education programs to the manufacturers of SMRs. MU plans for this to be a 3 year process. The project will advance a comprehensive training strategy to develop a high-skill, high-quality workforce for manufacturers in the nuclear power industry while assessing the education, training, and certification needed to support the SMR effort.

Director of Economic Development for Ameren Missouri Michael Kearney says he is very excited to be team up with MU for this project. Last year, Ameren Missouri and Westinghouse were denied federal funding from the US Department of Energy for the project to build SMRs in Missouri that could have provided hundreds of millions of dollars to the project.