February 4, 1966

Two major, advanced design reactors tested at higher power levels

The United States’ reactor program took an important step forward when two new nuclear reactors at Oak Ridge National Laboratory began to operate at significant power levels almost simultaneously.

The Molten Salt Reactor Experiment (MSRE) and the High Flux Isotope Reactor (HFIR) had been under construction for five years and had achieved initial criticality in mid-1965. 

HFIR would produce, for the first time, sizeable quantities of the synthetic elements including berkelium, californium, einsteinium, and fermium. Some of these had existed only in the stars in weighable amounts. 

 

Fueled by uranium-238, the High Flux Isotope Reactor remains the most powerful research reactor in the United States.
(Photo Credit: ORNL/U.S. Department of Energy)

 

 

Source: The ORNL News