NuScale Power Corp. (SMR) just announced a partnership with Oak Ridge National Laboratory that sounds straight out of a sci-fi novel: using artificial intelligence to make nuclear reactors run more efficiently. The collaboration, disclosed Thursday, aims to deploy an AI-powered nuclear design framework to enhance fuel management across multiple reactors operating at the same site.

AI Meets Nuclear Energy

This isn't just NuScale dreaming big on its own dime. The project has backing from the U.S. Department of Energy's Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear initiative, known as GAIN. That's the DOE Office of Nuclear Energy's program designed to help push nuclear technology from the lab into the real world, and it's throwing support behind this effort as part of its first round of vouchers for fiscal year 2026.

The heart of the project is optimizing fuel costs and management strategies for NuScale's 12-NuScale Power Module configuration. Here's where things get interesting: NuScale's multi-module architecture means you could potentially have up to 12 reactors sharing fuel resources at one site. If AI can figure out how to orchestrate that dance more efficiently, you're looking at serious cost savings and better energy output.

Why This Could Matter

The idea is that Oak Ridge's computational firepower combined with NuScale's reactor design could unlock fuel strategies that humans might not spot on their own. We're talking about using machine learning to crunch massive amounts of data and find optimization patterns that could translate into real dollars saved and more efficient power generation.

NuScale President and CEO John Hopkins clearly sees the potential. "We are thrilled to be collaborating with ORNL, with the support of the DOE, to assess exciting new opportunities for potentially managing fuel even more efficiently across multiple nuclear reactors and further reducing costs going forward," he said.

Oak Ridge brings serious credentials to the table here. The lab has deep expertise in AI, machine learning, and the computational resources needed to tackle this kind of complex modeling work. It's the kind of partnership that makes sense when you're trying to push the boundaries of what's possible in nuclear energy.

Small Modular Reactors, Big Ambitions

The GAIN funding is designed to boost NuScale's work on advanced small modular reactor technology, which the company positions as a scalable, carbon-free answer to growing global energy demands. NuScale has been at this since 2007, and it's carved out a leadership position in the SMR space. In fact, its designs were the first small modular reactors to receive certification from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which is no small feat.

The company is scheduled to report its fourth-quarter and full-year 2025 results on February 26, 2026, so investors will soon get a fuller picture of how the business is tracking.

SMR Price Action: NuScale Power shares were trading down 3.18% at $15.07 at the time of publication on Thursday.