Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) has been chosen by Japan’s Agency for Natural Resources and Energy to lead the development of a high temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTGR) programme aimed at producing clean hydrogen.
MHI said it will coordinate the research and development, design and construction of the HTGR demonstration reactor that the agency plans to put into operation in the 2030s.
The company said that to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, initiatives have begun to use clean hydrogen in industrial sectors such as iron and steel, and chemicals, along with transportation and other hard-to-abate industries.
HTGRs, also known as very-high-temperature reactors (VHTRs) are Generation IV reactors that can operate at very high temperatures and use a graphite-moderated gas-cooled nuclear reactor with a once-through uranium fuel cycle, meaning the fuel is not reprocessed.