00:05We are in the northwest of the U.S.
00:08At the foot of the Rockies is the largest nuclear power research center in the Western world.
00:13Only those who have a security clearance are allowed on the premises.
00:19It's a gigantic area, and there are all kinds of different research departments.
00:26The Idaho National Lab is at U.S. Department of Energy Lab.
00:29The vast majority of nuclear energy research takes place here in this lab.
00:35Pretty much all the reactor technologies that you see around the world were tested in one form or another at
00:41this site here.
00:42Abdul Doulou has worked in the industry for many years. Now, he's the chief scientist here.
00:50So, with that heritage you want, here the Idaho National Lab is very well positioned to host the next demonstration
01:01of the next advanced reactor technologies.
01:04That's why it's playing such a key role in this resurgence of nuclear power.
01:09Abdul shows us the hot fuel examination facility. This is where research is being done on the new small reactors.
01:16The facility is there to safely examine highly radioactive material.
01:20This gigantic box consists of one and a half meter thick concrete walls, interrupted only by windows made of six
01:28-paned safety glass.
01:30All the work in here has to be done from the outside with the help of gripper arms.
01:35They are currently examining fuel rods that will later provide the energy in the power plant.
01:41They will look at how that fuel behaves under the radiation.
01:45Does it behave as predicted as what the, you know, they did a lot of calculations, of course, to predict
01:50how the fuel is going to behave.
01:52Those experiments that we do here confirm or do not confirm those calculations.
01:57So that's allow the designer to know.
01:59And that's a very important step before actually taking this, putting the fuel in an actual reactor
02:05and demonstrating and then going on to the commercial stage.
02:09The End
02:10The End
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