Following months of uncertainty regarding its financial future, NuScale Power announced Thursday that Texas-based Fluor Corp. will invest $30 million in the company and allow it to continue work on its small modular reactor design.
"Fluor's financial and technical involvement at this point in the development of our technology will ensure that we maintain a leadership position in the nation's effort to provide the next generation of nuclear power plants — plants that are elegantly simple, avoid large capital outlays and offer significantly enhanced safety," NuScale CEO Paul Lorenzini said in a release.
NuScale was formed in 2007 following successful research by Oregon State University, and earlier the Idaho National Laboratory, into reactor designs using natural circulation for passive core cooling. Following a technology transfer from the university, the company approached the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 2008 seeking pre-application review and eventual design certification for a 40 megawatt small modular reactor.
The promising project came to a halt, though, early this year when an investment from the Michael Kenwood Group dissolved amid fraud charges levied at that firm and its management. NuScale was never accused of wrongdoing but lost much of its funding in the process.
Fluor began making loans to NuScale over the summer to keep it afloat, the Oregonian newspaper reported. The deal announced Thursday converts loans to stock and grants Fluor a 55 percent stake in the company.