About ANItA
The Academic Industrial Nuclear Technology Initiative (ANitA) is a competence centre that brings together industrial and academic expertise in nuclear technology. Through interdisciplinary research and development, ANItA's mission is to generate knowledge-based decision support for efficient and safe implementation of small modular reactors (SMRs) to contribute to Sweden's ambition to become a completely fossil-free nation.
ANItA:s management
Program council:
- Sophie Grape, Uppsala universitet, head of the center
- Nils Olov Jonsson, INPol AB, president of the council
- Saida Engström, Vattenfall, member
- Marcus Lindahl, Uppsala universitet, member
- Joakim Lundström, Studsvik, member
- Mats Jonsson, KTH, member
- Lena Oliver, Westinghouse, member
- Teodora Retegan Vollmer, Chalmers, member
- Mats Yngvesson, Uniper, member
- Nici Bergroth, Fortum, member
Observers:
- Cheuk Lau, Radiation Safety Authority in Sweden (SSM)
- Aapo Tanskanen, Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority in Finland (STUK)
- Martina Sturek, Women in Nuclear
- Marit Marsh Strömberg, Energimyndigheten
ANItA in numbers
- 5 years: the competence center project ongoing through 2022-2026
- 81 MSEK total budget
- 5 partner companies
- 3 universities
- 14 projects
ANItA:s vision
The welfare society’s ability to create and support good health, peace, and sustainability in all its aspects, is undeniable. Such welfare societies are underpinned by an adequate energy supply. However, the basis for most current welfare societies is the utilisation of fossil fuel, which creates highly unwanted effects such as health degradation, environmental issues, and an increasing global temperature. These negative consequences affect not only welfare countries but also, through various mechanisms and to a greater extent, the poor countries of the world. These considerations lend themselves to the formulation of a vision where research shall be a determining factor for promoting a future where:
- the economic basis for supporting the Swedish welfare society is secured,
- Sweden, using rational means, constructively participates in the quest to create a global welfare society,
- knowledge, technology, ability, and economical prerequisites for combating global climate change is fully developed,
- useful energy, from a lifecycle perspective, is generated with as small environmental footprints as possible. In such a way, maximum biodiversity is achieved and pristine wilderness, nationally as well as internationally, is preserved as far as possible.
ANItA has a determining role to play in this vision. During the first five years of its existence, ANItA will be under development and the first general results will emerge. During the next five years, ANItA is consolidated and redirects its efforts towards the implementation stage of the first SMR units in Sweden. The years after that, ANItA functions as a provider of competences and act as a de facto technical support organisation in Sweden.
ANItA's goals are:
- through research and development, generate knowledge-based decision support aimed at quick and safe implementation of new nuclear power technology in Sweden. This is to enable Sweden to become a completely fossil-free nation.
- generate new national nuclear technical expertise to ensure safe operation of existing and future nuclear power facilities.
- spread fact-based knowledge in the nuclear technology area to both the public and decision-makers.
- develop into a technical support organization for politics, authorities and society at large.
- create good conditions for Swedish industry and social life to benefit from a good energy supply, and so that Swedish industry can become an important partner to international reactor suppliers.
What are Small Modular Reactors?
Small modular reactors (SMRs) are a collective name for some seventy different reactor designs. Common to these is that they generate up to about 300 MW of electrical power, i.e. about a quarter of modern large reactors. They are also relatively physically small and can be placed close to consumers.
A basic idea of SMRs is that they should be factory manufactured and type approved. This shortens the time it takes to get these reactors into operation. Through type approval and a high degree of standardization, SMRs are expected to receive a relatively low price.
In addition to electricity production, SMRs can be used for other purposes such as district heating in cities, process steam for industry and efficient hydrogen production.
Within ANItA, we focus our operations on SMRs of the so-called light water type, which are based on similar technology to today's reactors. The reason for this is that these concepts are now close to market and can technically be quickly implemented.
These reactors are equipped with highly efficient passive safety systems based on simple physical principles and mean that no external power supply is necessary or that active measures are required from operators to shut down the reactors in the event that an undesirable operating mode is initiated. Furthermore, these reactors can quite easily be located underground or in caverns to achieve a high level of protection against external influences.
More about ANItA
The Academic-industrial Nuclear technology Initiative to Achieve a sustainable energy future - ANItA, was conceptualised in 2021 and began operating in 2022. ANItA is a collaboration platform currently consisting of: Uppsala University (host), Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) and Chalmers as academic partners. The industrial partners are: Vattenfall, Uniper, Fortum, Westinghouse and Studsvik Nuclear. The state is represented by the Swedish Energy Agency, with Swedish and Finnish regulators, and Women in Nuclear as observers.
Through research and development, ANItAs mission is to generate knowledge-based decision support that facilitates efficient and timely implementation of new nuclear power technology in Sweden, particularly light-water small modular reactors (SMRs). Part of this mission is also to secure and develop the important supply of expertise in the nuclear power technology field. The collaboration also aims to facilitate a rational debate in society on the role nuclear power has in addressing environmental and climate issues while keeping high welfare ambitions intact. Between 2022 and 2026, ANItA is funded with one third each from industry, academia and the Swedish Energy Agency, and the total budget amounts to approximately €8m during these first five years.
To address the different aspects of the mission, a joint research portfolio was developed that met the interests of both industry and academia and was in line with the analyses carried out concerning the requirements of implementing a new reactor technology. The resulting research portfolio currently consists of 14 projects comprising research and development work within technical and non-technical subjects. The projects are staffed with PhD students and postdoctoral researchers with supervision and senior participation from both the academy and industry. In this context, it is important to point out that ANItA is not involved in the design or construction of SMRs. Instead, it relies upon relevant information from the current reactor suppliers to reach ANItA to establish realistic scenarios for the research and development work.
ANItAs project portfolio is divided into five research areas according to:
- A. SMR technologies and applications
- B. SMR-specific core, fuel, and operation
- C. SMR-specific reactor safety and safety systems
- D. Fuel cycles
- E. Deployment of new nuclear technology in Sweden
Research areas A-D cover a broad range of technical subjects relevant to light-water SMR utilisation. In brief terms, the projects deal with the following issues:
- Optimised chemistry for LWR SMRs
- Structural materials issues
- Fuel assembly and core design optimisation for SMRs
- Novel reactor monitoring techniques
- Novel approaches to nuclear safeguards
- Experimental methods for accelerating fuel development
- Recycling of spent nuclear fuel
- Applications beyond electricity generation
- Studying the role of SMRs in hybrid energy systems
- Design basis and beyond design basis scenarios, passive safety systems
While research areas A-D cover typical technical topics in nuclear engineering, research area E covers non-technical areas that directly affect the implementation of SMRs. Such areas are laws and regulations, as well as project strategies, financing models and ownership issues. Work in these areas is carried out at Uppsala University's Department of Business Studies and the Department of Industrial Engineering.