NuScale Power and Nucor to explore deployment of small modular reactors to power electric arc furnace steel mills

NuScale Power Corporation and Nucor Corporation signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to explore co-locating NuScale’s VOYGR small modular nuclear reactor (SMR) power plants to provide clean, reliable baseload electricity to Nucor’s scrap-based Electric Arc Furnace (EAF) steel mills.

The companies will also explore an expanded manufacturing partnership through which Nucor, the largest steel producer and recycler of any type of material in North America, would supply Econiq, its net-zero steel products, for NuScale projects.

As part of the MOU, the companies will evaluate site suitability, transmission interconnection capabilities and capital costs for potential NuScale plants to be sited near and provide carbon free electricity to Nucor EAF steel mills. In addition, NuScale will study the feasibility of siting a manufacturing facility for NuScale Power Modules near a Nucor facility.

NuScale power module.

NuScale’s VOYGR power plants, which can be scaled in different plant configurations to produce up to 924 MWe of output (77 MWe per module), are well-suited for industrial applications as a highly reliable source of carbon-free energy. As the first and only SMR design to be approved and certified by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, NuScale’s VOYGR plants include fully passive safety features which eliminate the need for an external grid connection to perform key safety functions and can achieve a site boundary Emergency Planning Zone, improving plant siting flexibility for industrial users such as Nucor.

The agreement strengthens NuScale’s partnership with Nucor, which invested $15 million in NuScale in 2022, and highlights the growing global interest in SMRs among industrial leaders.

The US Department of Energy has identified emissions reductions in the steel manufacturing industry as an important step to reach net-zero by 2050.

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