General Atomics Gets $240-Million Contract

The U. S. Department of Energy Wednesday awarded La Jolla-based General Atomics a $240-million, five-year contract to produce preliminary and final designs for the nuclear part of a Modular High Temperature Gas-Cooled Reactor.

General Atomics is leading a team of companies that is seeking about $450 million in federal funding to design a MHTGR nuclear unit that eventually would be sold to electrical utilities, according to Walt Simon, General Atomics’ director of business development. General Atomics’ MHTGR team includes Bechtel International, Combustion Engineering and Stone & Webster Engineering.

The Energy Department contract won’t appreciably increase employment at General Atomics, Simon said. But the contract will allow the La Jolla-based company to further advance its proprietary MHTGR technology, Simon said.

Wednesday’s contract represents “the first step on the way to a licensed final design,” Simon said. “It’s a multiyear contract, which means we don’t have to go through contract negotiations every year.”

General Atomics will receive about $20 million of the $240 million during 1989, Simon said. The rest of the contract will be “contingent upon appropriations by Congress on a year-to-year basis,” Simon said.

The MHTGR is a nuclear reactor technology that some energy experts view as a “safer alternative to conventional reactors,” according to Energy Department spokeswoman Carol Powell. The units would use fuel that can withstand extremely high temperatures--but that will not melt down, Powell said.

“At the end of five years we would hope to have a completely finished, licensed design,” Simon said. Wednesday’s design award did not include any funds for construction of a nuclear reactor, Simon said.

The Energy Department award was the second in recent months for General Atomics. It won a $217-million award in November for research into nuclear fusion. The two awards are not related, Simon said.