China leads on small modular reactors deployment
As countries in the West finalise approvals and pilot schemes, China is already building and operating SMRs.
The high-temperature gas-cooled HTR‑PM reactor, a Generation IV design using pebble-bed fuel, reached commercial status in 2023 at Shidao Bay — the world’s first grid-connected, commercially operating SMR.
And, in April 2025, the first of four main pumps were installed at the ACP100 small modular reactor demonstration project, under construction at the Changjiang site on China’s island province of Hainan.
These projects sit alongside China’s aggressive large-scale reactor program, with an estimated 23 reactors under construction.
The US playing catch-up — fast
In May 2025, US President Trump signed an Executive Order “to accelerate the secure and responsible development, demonstration, deployment, and export of United States designed advanced nuclear technologies.”
Trump’s order builds on recent momentum with the Accelerating Deployment of Versatile, Advance Nuclear for Clean Energy Act (the ADVANCE Act) in 2024, new design approvals, utility construction permits, and more than US$900 million in latest funding from the Department of Energy (DoE), including:
- Holtec, once sidelined in the global SMR race, is preparing to install two SMR-300 units at the Palisades site in Michigan, after securing a US$1.5 billion conditional loan from the Department of Energy
- the Tennessee Valley Authority and GE Hitachi are advancing a BWRX-300 at the Clinch River site in Oak Ridge with a new application for a US$800 million in DoE funding
- NuScale, once the poster child for US SMRs, stumbled with project cost inflation and lost its Utah backers in 2023 — but has had its newer design approved
- Westinghouse Electric Company is planning a rollout of SMR fleet