Molten Salt Reactor Workshop, Knoxville, Tennessee

Last week, Cambridge Atomworks joined the 325 attendees to the Molten Salt Reactor Workshop 2025 in Knoxville, Tennessee.

We enjoyed the chance to catch up on recent developments in the area of Molten Salt Reactors, and in particular, to learn about emerging challenges and opportunities in the field, such as the developing legislative landscape, and the recycling of spent nuclear fuel.

Dr Thomas Chalklen, Materials Engineer at Cambridge Atomworks, had the opportunity to design and present a poster on the decomposition behaviour of solar salt in reactor conditions, with interest from the MSR community on the novel ODIN™ reactor design, especially as the only molten nitrate salt design present. The event also presented the chance to discover what alternative approaches are being trialled, with high hopes for future successes in the field.

Highlights of the event included learning about the Molten Salt Thermal Properties Database, meeting a wide range of people, from industry, academia and research institutions and seeing the growth of the MSR community over the last few years.

Several valuable collaborations are now being pursued in the areas of irradiation testing, thermal property modelling and corrosion studies, with updates expected in the new year.