Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee and U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn, the Republican nominee for governor, will attend a ceremony as the Tennessee Valley Authority receives a historic nuclear reactor construction permit on Tuesday.
Both Lee and Blackburn have argued that TVA, the nation’s largest public power provider, will be a fundamental tool for achieving President Donald Trump’s nuclear ambitions. Lee has aimed to make Tennessee the top state for new nuclear development.
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is set to issue a construction permit at TVA’s Knoxville headquarters for a 300-megawatt small modular reactor planned in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, according to a media advisory released Monday.
The permit is only the second issued in the U.S. for a commercial advanced reactor, after TerraPower received a permit in March to build a salt-cooled Natrium reactor in Wyoming. TVA will be the first utility company to receive the permit, and its reactor will be the first of its kind to get the approval.
(READ MORE: Tennessee Valley will be like Silicon Valley for nuclear, top official says)