Beyond the Blueprint
Chad Boyer is EPRI Senior Principal Technical Leader.
The September 2025 update to the Advanced Reactor Roadmap, jointly developed by EPRI and the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), arrived at a pivotal moment — not just for nuclear energy, but for the entire energy ecosystem.
While headlines often focus on the promise of small modular reactors (SMRs) or the race to deploy first-of-a-kind technologies, the real story lies deeper: in the strategic infrastructure being built to enable advanced nuclear to scale, integrate, and contribute to the global energy mix well into the future.
This is not just about new reactors. It’s about actively helping to reshape how the industry designs, licenses, builds, and operates nuclear power plants in a world where reliability, resilience, and energy security are no longer competing priorities — they are simultaneous imperatives. As Marc Nichol, executive director of new Nuclear at NEI said, “When it comes to new nuclear power, the challenge isn’t demand but being able to build fast enough to meet it.”
A System-Level Shift
The roadmap’s most important contribution may be its shift from technology-centric optimism to system-level realism. It recognizes that advanced nuclear must be more than innovative; it must be deployable, financeable, and replicable.