Technology thesis · Clean Energy
high conviction hyped emergingSmall modular reactors
TerraPower's Natrium won the first US commercial-scale construction permit in March 2026 and Part 53 is live, but no SMR yet generates a watt; the commercial era starts 2027-2030.
Position maintained continuously · last reviewed Jun 24, 2026
The thesis
Core thesis
SMRs promise factory-built reactors at $1-3B per plant versus $10-20B for conventional gigawatt builds. NuScale (Jose Reyes) holds the only certified US design - the 77 MWe US460 cleared NRC review in May 2025 - but its first US firm order is still pending. Kairos Power (Mike Laufer) is building the Hermes test reactor and has a TVA-Google PPA for Hermes 2; TerraPower (Bill Gates) won the first US commercial-scale construction permit for its 345 MWe Natrium in March 2026 and is building at Kemmerer, Wyoming. AI data-centre demand drives the offtake: the SMR pipeline has doubled to roughly 45 GW. But no SMR yet generates commercial power - the first US units arrive 2027-2030.
State of the art (2026)
The US advanced-reactor era opened in earnest in 2026. The NRC's Part 53 framework – the first new reactor-licensing rulebook since 1989 – took effect on 29 April 2026, and TerraPower's 345 MWe Natrium received the first commercial-scale advanced-reactor construction permit on 4 March 2026, with construction now under way at Kemmerer, Wyoming. Demand is led by hyperscalers: Kairos Power's Hermes 2 (50 MWe) anchors the first US Gen IV utility PPA (TVA–Google, Aug 2025) for 2030 operations; X-energy and Dow's Long Mott permit sits in accelerated NRC review; Oklo, Amazon and Meta hold multi-gigawatt pipelines. No SMR yet generates commercial power, but the regulatory and offtake scaffolding is now built.
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Signal stack
Evidence stacked leading → lagging
Technology-native KPIs
Metrics that predict trajectory, tracked over time
Landscape map
Who builds what — and who depends on whom
Catalyst calendar
Dated events that will move the position
Technology roadmap
Milestones on the path to maturity
Watchlists
Companies, people and papers — each with a remove-by condition
Decision frameworks
The same call, framed for your desk
Thesis changelog
When our view changed, and why
Change our mind
3 disconfirming conditions
The rest is inside
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The full signal stack, technology-native KPIs tracked over time, the landscape of who depends on whom, the dated catalyst calendar, decision frameworks for every desk, live watchlists and the changelog of every time our call on Small modular reactors has changed — all live inside CanaryIQ.