Chris Wright

“The Energy Department's new Reactor Pilot Program will expedite testing of advanced nuclear reactor designs under DOE authority, outside the national laboratories and without NRC licensing, "ensuring at least three reactors achieve criticality by July 4, 2026."”

Chris WrightThought Leader

U.S. Secretary of Energy

The target was met: Antares Nuclear's Mark-0 went critical in early June 2026, Valar Atomics' Ward 250 on June 22, and Deployable Energy's Unity in the final days of June, with Aalo Atomics' Aalo-X adding a fourth on July 4 itself. Caveats: these were zero- or very low-power test-reactor demonstrations (Valar reached about 10 kWt), and several were sited at Idaho National Laboratory rather than fully off-lab.

“"I'm pretty confident we'll have one of them before July 4th of next year, and several more during the year. It's not the back-end electricity production, but it's the whole nuclear system running, demonstrating how it will work" — the U.S. will have at least one next-generation small reactor operating before July 4, 2026.”

Chris WrightThought Leader

U.S. Secretary of Energy

Four privately built advanced test reactors reached criticality under DOE authorization by July 4, 2026 (Antares, Valar Atomics, Deployable Energy and Aalo Atomics), matching Wright's framing of a full system demonstration rather than electricity production — though these are kilowatt-scale test units, not operating commercial SMRs.