2 Overview INTRODUCTION AND In 2019, Idaho National Laboratory will be celebrating the 70th anniversary of nuclear energy research and innovation in Idaho. In 1949, the Atomic Energy Commission selected the eastern Snake River Plain as the location for the National Reactor Testing Station (NRTS) and its mission of understanding how to harness the power of the atom for peaceful use. That year, on the Idaho desert, the entirely new industry of commercial nuclear energy was born. As we observe that anniversary in the midst of a worldwide nuclear energy resurgence, INL is poised to double down on the mission that began all those years ago. Two reactors that helped drive innovation over the decades will continue the work: the Transient Reactor Test Facility (TREAT), built in 1959, and the Advanced Test Reactor (ATR), built in 1967. After nearly a quarter century on operational standby, TREAT was restarted in 2017 and performed its first modern fueled irradiation experiment in September 2018. This experiment was part of a series testing new fuels that have enhanced tolerance to accident conditions. TREAT’s revival marks the return of a capability critical to America’s role in developing fuels for both the existing fleet and a new generation of advanced reactors. Meanwhile at ATR, interest from public and private researchers continued to grow. The second phase of accident tolerant fuel development and commercialization (ATF-2) began with 26 miniature fuel rods being loaded into ATR’s center flux trap for irradiation through early 2021. At one point, 52 of the 75 experimental positions made possible by ATR’s unique cloverleaf design contained either an experiment or an isotope target (Co-60). This is the highest occupancy rate the reactor has ever experienced, illustrating the nation’s growing need for ATR’s distinctive irradiation capabilities. Millennial NUCLEAR CAUCUS Find Yourself in Nuclear Opera singer and Generation Atomic founder Eric Meyer