The 2022 US-EU International Nuclear Energy Research Initiative (INERI) call, published on 20 January 2022, gives projects co-funded by Euratom an opportunity for cooperation with US Department of Energy (DOE) projects.

To apply to the call, joint mini-proposals must reflect collaborative arrangements for cooperative R&D involving at least one participant from the DOE national laboratories and/or US universities and one participant from Euratom. There is no funding associated with the selection for the INERI collaboration, so the US and EURATOM participants must already be funded and identify such funding in their proposal.

The call areas of collaboration are the following:

  • Light water reactor (LWR) materials aging and degradation
  • Technologies to enhance the safety and operational efficiency of existing nuclear power plants (including plant lifetime management and lifetime extension for LWRs)
  • Technologies to enhance the safety, operational efficiency, and safeguards and security posture of advanced nuclear reactor designs currently under development
  • Innovative concepts for Small Modular Reactors (SMRs)
  • Improvements in core nuclear physics
  • Technologies to maximize the safety and proliferation resistance of advanced nuclear reactor and fuel cycle technologies
  • Hybrid energy systems that integrate nuclear energy with other energy technologies and applications beyond electricity production
  • Advanced nuclear fuels including accident-tolerant LWR fuels, claddings and materials
  • Advanced waste forms characterization and management
  • Decommissioning
  • Used nuclear fuel storage and disposition technologies
  • Nuclear science and ionizing radiation applications, radiation protection, emergency preparedness
  • Modeling and simulation, including experiments, validation and verification, and data sharing for model benchmarking and validation
  • Innovative manufacturing and fabrication techniques
  • Advanced sensors and instrumentation
  • Studies on the public perception and policy of nuclear energy

The deadline to apply for this call is 16 February 2022.

For more information, download the call announcement and the mini-proposal template here.