en.Wedoany.com Reported - TRISO-X, a subsidiary of US nuclear fuel technology company X-energy, has received financial support from the Tennessee state government to expand the TRISO-X nuclear fuel manufacturing campus in Oak Ridge. The funding is allocated through the Tennessee Nuclear Energy Supply Chain Investment Fund, established by Governor Bill Lee in 2023 to support nuclear energy investments, workforce development, and site preparation, thereby expanding the state's nuclear manufacturing ecosystem. The expansion project will proceed at the Horizon Center in Oak Ridge, adjacent to TRISO-X's first commercial-scale fuel manufacturing facility, which is being developed in collaboration with the US Department of Energy.

The entire campus plans to include three facilities: the TX-1 plant, the TX-2 plant, and a dedicated fuel manufacturing laboratory, TX-L. The TX-1 plant, expected to become the first facility in the US designed specifically for commercial TRISO fuel manufacturing, is currently under construction and aims to establish a domestic supply chain for TRISO-X fuel. The TX-2 plant, as a second, larger-scale fuel manufacturing facility, will build on TX-1's operational experience to enhance automation and production efficiency, and is projected to create over 1,000 permanent jobs. The TX-L laboratory will focus on fuel innovation, testing, and continuous improvement of the TRISO manufacturing process. Together, these three facilities aim to establish domestic commercial-scale manufacturing and research capabilities for TRISO-X fuel—the company's proprietary tri-structural isotropic advanced nuclear reactor fuel.

X-energy stated that TX-1, TX-2, and TX-L are the result of nearly a decade of fuel development and qualification efforts by the company and TRISO-X. This journey began in 2016 with the construction of a pilot facility at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, aimed at optimizing established TRISO manufacturing processes for commercial-scale production. In 2025, TRISO-X fuel became the first commercial advanced nuclear fuel to undergo irradiation testing in the Advanced Test Reactor at Idaho National Laboratory, with ongoing tests to qualify TRISO-X fuel for the Xe-100 reactor and expand the performance envelope of TRISO fuel.

According to X-energy, upon completion, the campus is expected to become one of the world's largest commercial-scale nuclear fuel manufacturing campuses, with the capacity to produce enough TRISO-X fuel to support approximately 55 of X-energy's Xe-100 advanced small modular reactors, corresponding to nearly 4.5 gigawatts of new advanced nuclear capacity—enough to meet the electricity needs of 3.3 million US households. TRISO-X President Joel Dooling stated that this is a significant step toward building a world-class nuclear fuel campus to power the next generation of nuclear energy, and that Oak Ridge is a cornerstone of nuclear innovation.

Construction of the first facility, TX-1, began last November at the Horizon Center in Oak Ridge and is expected to become the first facility in the US dedicated to manufacturing fuel for advanced small modular reactors. The plant will manufacture X-energy's proprietary TRISO fuel for the initial deployment of the Xe-100 reactor at the Dow Inc. site in Seadrift, Texas, on the Gulf Coast, as well as for future Xe-100 projects. In February, TRISO-X received a 40-year special nuclear material license from the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, allowing it to use high-assay low-enriched uranium for commercial fuel manufacturing at TX-1 and TX-2. TRISO fuel consists of enriched uranium kernels coated with multiple layers of carbon and ceramic materials, forming a robust shell capable of withstanding high temperatures. HALEU contains 5% to 20% fissile uranium-235, with enrichment levels higher than the typical uranium fuel used in current commercial reactors (which has a uranium-235 content of 3.5% to 5%).