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Valar Atomics Says It’s the First Nuclear Startup to Achieve Criticality

November 18, 2025/

A Trump administration pilot program aims for three nuclear startups to reach a key milestone by July 4, 2026. Valar Atomics says it’s the first to do so—but it had some help.
The DOE’s pilot program is helping several of the involved startups move “at speeds not seen since the Manhattan Project,” as Nuclear NewsWire put it in a piece published Monday. Even in this ambitious field, Valar stands out for its aggressive goals: The company announced in May that it intends to turn on a fully functional model of its reactor by the July 4 deadline of next year. It started breaking ground at the intended site in late September.


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