Rwanda announced Wednesday that it has inked an agreement with a US business to develop nuclear energy by building mini-reactors in the East African country.
According to the memorandum of understanding, Nano Nuclear Energy Inc will provide technical help, training, and instruction, as well as construct an undefined number of small modular reactors (SMRs) and microreactors.
Construction of the SMRs and microreactors would take place in the “next few years”, Nano Nuclear CEO James Walker told a press conference in Rwanda, foreseeing a “very smooth path towards a very developed civil nuclear programme”.
“In Rwanda you have small communities with a few thousand people that doesn’t justify a big reactor system, but you could put a microreactor there and it could serve up to 3,000 people for 20 years without need for refuelling.”
SMRs produce roughly a third of the power generated by traditional reactors, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency, but can be mass-produced and then transported to their locations.
Rwanda, a country of about 13 million people, currently generates about 51 percent of its electricity from thermal sources, followed by hydro-power at around 44 percent and around four percent from solar power.
The deal aims to ensure that Rwanda has a “robust ability to maintain a self-sustaining domestic nuclear energy industry”, RAEB said.
The MoU follows a deal Kigali reached with Canadian-German start-up Dual Fluid last year to build a nuclear reactor, expected to be operational in 2026.