NASA/Kim Shiflett / Public domain
Project Omega announced in Newport, Rhode Island, on November 9 that it has raised $80 million in Series A financing led by B Capital to advance power-system manufacturing and begin construction of a nuclear-fuel recycling pilot facility. The financing is not an announcement that a commercial recycling plant has opened or that new nuclear-reactor electricity is reaching the grid.
The company release names noa VC and 645 Ventures among the participants. Existing investors taking part include Starship Ventures, Mantis Ventures, Decisive Point, Virta Ventures, Pace Ventures, Essential Capital and Washington Harbour Partners. B Capital general partner and global head of energy Jeff Johnson will join Project Omega’s board. The company did not disclose a valuation or the ownership stakes sold.
Omega is working on a non-aqueous process called pyroprocessing to recover useful materials from used nuclear fuel. Its planned outputs include isotopes for long-duration power systems, reactor feedstock and materials for commercial, scientific and medical uses. The company says the process can recover strontium-90, does not separate pure plutonium and can reduce nuclear-waste volume by up to 90%. Those are company technology claims, not independently verified commercial-plant results in this announcement.
“We are building a vertically integrated strategy around an abundant domestic feedstock, with a non-aqueous recycling process that recovers useful isotopes, and products with clear strategic demand,” said founder and chief executive Stafford Sheehan. His estimate of nearly 100,000 metric tons of used nuclear fuel as a domestic resource is also a company claim. The announcement does not establish how much of that material Omega can access or process economically.
One intended application is radiovoltaic power: solid-state systems that convert the natural decay of radioisotopes directly into electricity. The company targets equipment where recharging, replacement batteries or human access are difficult, including remote sensors, autonomous systems, communications, spacecraft and undersea platforms. This is a product-development strategy, not a disclosure of customer orders, delivered isotope-powered products or proven commercial operating lifetimes.
That future isotope-power work is distinct from the current X Series. Omega describes those products as modular expeditionary power systems integrating battery storage and generators with intelligent controls, designed to allow solar and wind initially and isotope power later. The new funds will advance X Series technology and manufacturing as well as the recycling pilot. The announcement does not say the current X Series already runs on recovered radioisotopes.
Omega says it has advanced recycling work with Idaho National Laboratory through ARPA-E’s CURIE program, demonstrated stable electrical current from strontium-90 at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and developed radioisotope power systems through DARPA’s Rads to Watts program. These are the company’s descriptions of its laboratory and program work. They do not supply a commercial recycling throughput, unit cost, regulatory approval or a customer qualification result.
The business case is to connect fuel recycling with products that can use recovered materials, potentially creating more than one revenue source. Whether that works depends on scale, permissions, access to feedstock, reliable manufacturing and customers willing to pay. The release gives no pilot location, startup capacity, operating timetable or order book. Omega lists offices in Newport and Hailey, Idaho, and a cold laboratory in Fall River, Massachusetts; none is identified as the new pilot site. More facility details are promised in coming months, leaving those practical milestones ahead.
JBizNews Desk | Newport, Rhode Island
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