KNOXVILLE, Tenn.; TEMPE, Ariz.; WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — After 20 years of flat growth, America’s demand for electricity is exploding, creating a demand for safe and scalable nuclear reactor technology. Small modular reactors and microreactors are emerging to meet that need driving a national nuclear resurgence, but there is a severe shortage of nuclear-literate engineers, managers, and policymakers.
Three powerhouse public research universities—the University of Tennessee (UT), Arizona State University (ASU), and Purdue University—have united to respond to this in a flexible, trilateral alliance: the New Nuclear Academic Consortium. The NNAC aims to tackle the workforce shortage head-on by establishing a comprehensive regional and national ecosystem that prepares the next generation of graduates to deploy, manage and scale the new nuclear economy.
Several factors contribute to the nuclear industry workforce shortage. Much of the current workforce is approaching retirement, and many nuclear projects are in remote areas, making it difficult to attract qualified applicants. Traditional nuclear engineering programs produce specialized PhDs and design engineers, but the industry requires a breadth of professionals fluent in systems engineering, grid integration, advanced thermodynamics, supply chains, and safety regulations to execute the deployment of potentially thousands of decentralized reactors.
The three founding consortium members bring unique strengths and capabilities to the nuclear sector while also spanning three geographic regions of the United States. Each of these nationally ranked public research institutions is home to a large engineering program and contributes strong connections to and throughout the nuclear engineering industry.
In its role, UT contributes a top-ranked nuclear engineering department within the Tickle College of Engineering, bringing standalone bachelor’s, master’s, and PhD nuclear programs and seamless research integration with Oak Ridge National Laboratory. East Tennessee is also at the epicenter of the nuclear resurgence with more than 150 nuclear-related companies within 50 miles of Knoxville, including the Tennessee Valley Authority, which is moving towards construction of a small modular reactor at the Clinch River site and the Kairos Hermes 2 demonstration project.
“We are proud to be part of this unique partnership to expand access to education and training about nuclear engineering and the nuclear sector,” said Brian Wirth, TVA Department Head and UT-ORNL Governor’s Chair Professor of Computational Nuclear Engineering at UT. “While we have seen substantial growth in our on-campus student population and the establishment of a new minor in nuclear power engineering, this consortium will support the needed training requirements to grow the nuclear workforce.”
The NNAC concept originated at ASU, anchored by the university’s scale in online and technology-enabled education—including EdPlus (ASU’s digital learning division), the Decision Theater’s data driven policy modeling and Dreamscape Learn’s immersive curriculum tools. ASU’s primary initial contribution is a suite of three to five undergraduate micro-certificates, launching this year, that will equip mechanical, civil, electrical, materials and systems engineering students with nuclear fluency.
“The future of new nuclear energy is unfolding in front of us and the nation will need more graduates who are prepared to enter the nuclear industry,” said Kyle Squires, dean of ASU’s Fulton Schools of Engineering. ”This new consortium brings together three top public universities, each with tremendous expertise and reach, to increase the number of engineers prepared to work in the new nuclear industry and create courses and microcredentials that can be accessed by engineers at any U.S. university.”
Purdue will leverage its premier nuclear engineering program and Purdue University Reactor Number One (PUR-1), the nation’s first and only U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) facility licensed for a fully digital safety and control system. Purdue’s partnership with the NRC has flourished for more than 60 years, dating back to the university’s original operating license granted in 1962 and renewed in 2016. In 1997, the NRC established the Institute of Thermal-Hydraulics at Purdue with the objective of providing broad technical expertise and performing reactor safety research for the NRC. The commission also has funded fellowships for Purdue graduate students and scholarships to undergraduates pursuing nuclear engineering degrees.
Stylianos Chatzidakis, assistant professor in Purdue’s School of Nuclear Engineering, associate reactor director and director of the Nuclear Engineering Radiation Laboratories, is one of the NNAC’s founding partners and co-authored the consortium’s launch plan.
“Through the New Nuclear Academic Consortium, we have an opportunity to combine Purdue’s unique experimental and regulatory capabilities with the complementary strengths of ASU and the UT to create a new model for nuclear education,” Chatzidakis said. “Our goal is to give students meaningful exposure to real nuclear systems and hands-on advanced digital and cyber-physical technologies, so they are prepared not just to design the next generation of reactors, but to safely deploy and operate them at scale.”
The operational lifeblood of NNAC as an academic consortium relies on direct, actionable, multi-institution alignments.
One example of a promising strategic bilateral intersection is the Purdue-ASU project to build high-fidelity, interactive digital twins of PUR-1. Purdue provides licensing skills and the reactor data, physics models and expertise used to develop its in-house digital twin model of PUR-1, while ASU contributes its own digital twin knowledge, as well as its digital scale and immersive software engines to host and distribute virtual training models. In addition to potential educational applications like making PUR-1 digitally accessible to other colleges and universities, these simulations could stand in for traditional hands-on operations, offering a path toward innovative regulatory certifications.
Once launched, the consortium plans to invite additional research universities to join over the following six to 12 months. These programs could adopt or augment consortium-built micro-certificates for their undergraduate students, pursue jointly funded research or link to PUR-1 via digital twins.
About University of Tennessee
The University of Tennessee has shaped leaders, changemakers, and innovative thinkers since its founding in 1794. UT is home to more than 41,000 students and offers over 900 programs of study across 14 degree-granting colleges and schools. As Tennessee’s flagship land-grant university, UT has a footprint that spans the entire state with the Space Institute in Tullahoma and Institute of Agriculture Extension offices in all 95 counties. The university holds the highest Carnegie classification for research activity and has deep partnerships with industry leaders and the US Department of Energy’s largest multidisciplinary laboratory, Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
About Arizona State University
Arizona State University has developed a new model for the American research university, creating an institution that is committed to access, excellence and impact. ASU measures itself by those it includes, not by those it excludes. As the prototype for a New American University, ASU pursues research that contributes to the public good, and ASU assumes major responsibility for the economic, social and cultural vitality of the communities that it serves.
About Purdue University
Purdue University is a research institution ranked among the top 10 public universities in the United States. More than 106,000 students study at Purdue across multiple campuses, including more than 57,000 at our main campus locations in West Lafayette and Indianapolis. As a land-grant university committed to affordability and accessibility, Purdue’s main campus has frozen tuition 14 years in a row, enabling more students than ever to graduate debt-free.
Contact
Rhiannon Potkey ([email protected])