Valar Watch · Fact csite-007

Fact csite-007

newcompany claimconfirmed The Carbon plan includes a fuel factory: HALEU, LEU+ or LEU uranium shipped in and made into TRISO fuel on site

2026-09-17 · csite-007 · Valar Atomics, Utah Trust Lands Administration, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, U.S. Department of Energy

Under 'Fuel Feedstock Delivery & Handling', the memorandum says high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU), 'low-enriched uranium plus' (LEU+) or low-enriched uranium (LEU) may be delivered to the site in certified special-nuclear-material containers under NRC, DOT and DOE rules, and that the feedstock 'would then be manufactured into TRISO fuel pellets' for the reactors on site. The staff slides list 'Manufacture TRISO fuel' as a project purpose. The memo does not say which enrichment Valar would use, how much uranium would be kept on site, or which agency would license the fuel plant. Valar's own documents already disagree on whether Ward 250's fuel is 4.95% LEU or HALEU (disc-001, orig-040); the Carbon memo leaves all three grades open.

In plain termsThe Carbon campus is meant to make nuclear fuel as well as use it. Enriched uranium would be trucked in and turned into TRISO fuel: tiny coated beads, each about the size of a poppy seed, packed into larger fuel pieces. DOE's own description says the beads are made into 'cylindrical pellets' or ball-shaped 'pebbles', so the memo's word 'pellets' matches DOE usage (exp-001). The grade is not fixed: LEU (the grade today's power reactors use, enriched up to 5% in the uranium that splits, per DOE), 'LEU+' (a grade between) or HALEU (DOE: between 5% and less than 20%; orig-040). Richer uranium means more of the material that sustains a chain reaction, so how much would be stored and how it would be guarded matters to neighbours. The records read do not answer that yet.

09.17.2026 TLA Board Packet (Item 10A: SULA 2095-OBA Board of Trustees Memorandum, Carbon County letter, lease map) (Utah Trust Lands Administration (Utah Public Notice Website), 2026-09-17) primary government “That uranium feedstock would then be manufactured into TRISO fuel pellets”
TLA Board of Trustees meeting presentation, August 20, 2026 (Item 9A slides: SULA 2095 OBA) (Utah Trust Lands Administration (Utah Public Notice Website), 2026-08-20) primary government “Manufacture TRISO fuel”
What is High-Assay Low-Enriched Uranium (HALEU)? (U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Nuclear Energy, 2024-12-03) primary government “HALEU is enriched between 5% and 20% in U-235”
TRISO Particles: The Most Robust Nuclear Fuel on Earth (U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Nuclear Energy, 2019-07-09) primary government “They can be fabricated into cylindrical pellets or billiard ball-sized spheres”

verified 2026-09-29: Holds. Re-read 2026-09-29: memo p. 19 (TRISO fuel manufacturing) and p. 22 (Fuel Feedstock Delivery & Handling); August slides p. 43. Quotes exact. Kind company_claim: the applicant's plan relayed by the state. Plain text tightened (grade definitions tied to orig-040). Second check 29 Sept 2026: grade and fuel-form wording in the plain text now rests on DOE's HALEU and TRISO pages (read 29 Sept). DOE calls the fabricated forms 'cylindrical pellets' or 'pebbles', so the memo's 'TRISO fuel pellets' holds as a term; LEU is 'up to 5%' per DOE, not 'below 5%'.

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