Doug Bernauer’s Radiant is not trying to make SMRs. His company — a VC-backed startup currently in the pre-application phase with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission — is designing a portable nuclear microreactor, which is intended to replace diesel generators.

Although many have thought it was an urban myth, it’s actually true. There was a working nuclear reactor in the basement of the University of Wyoming Engineering Building in the 1960s. Dr. Victor Albert Ryan, a nuclear chemist, brought it with him to establish UW’s nuclear research program.

Attendees and participants alike want to understand more about the wide reach and impact of one topic that has a direct influence on where we will be able to go in the years ahead with low-carbon energy production and several other areas vital to our communities and economy.

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic four years ago, the federal government’s Idaho National Laboratory has focused attention on building closer ties with Wyoming and other states on research and deployment of advanced nuclear technologies.

Gillette Mayor Shay Lundvall has a vision for the coal-rich Powder River Basin in northeast Wyoming: Bring a components manufacturer and assembly factory together to build tiny nuclear power plants.