TVA awarded $400 million grant for the country’s first SMR

The Tennessee Valley Authority has been awarded a $400 million grant by the U.S. Department of Energy to speed up the development of the country’s first Small Modular Reactor at the TVA’s Clinch River nuclear site in East Tennessee. TVA is the first company in the U.S. to have a construction permit application for the BWRX-300 SMR accepted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The Department of Energy grant was established by Congress in 2024 to strengthen the U.S. domestic nuclear industry and spur the development of SMRs.