Crosscutting Technology Development

The NEET Crosscutting Technology Development (CTD) activity provides R&D support to various reactor and fuel cycle technologies, both existing and under development. These include several areas that crosscut multiple nuclear technologies CTD aims to do the following:

• Work with other NE R&D programs to identify critical capabilities and common technology needs.
• Encourage and lead coordinated research and development activities to deliver capabilities and technologies when needed to ensure NE R&D program success.
• Ensure scalability and compatibility of results across NE R&D programs.
• Reduce costs of resulting technologies and capabilities.
• Leverage programmatic investments to maximize benefits across the federal enterprise.

The capabilities developed through the NEET CTD program are intended to bridge critical gaps to enable advances in DOE-NE R&D programs. The NEET CTD program will address needs and requirements that are common to multiple programs. These needs, in turn, will be translated into actionable R&D activities and coordinated with the other R&D programs. For example, several DOE-NE R&D programs have identified a need for materials and sensors in high-temperature environments (i.e., greater than 600°C). By identifying common requirements that can be coordinated and carried out within NEET, DOE-NE can develop plans that more specifically address the unique needs of the other R&D programs.

The NEET CTD program is also less constrained by the programmatic focus of an individual DOE-NE R&D program. It is able to look beyond immediate technical needs that already exist and identify critical and enabling capabilities that are required to ensure the success of individual R&D programs. Examples of enabling capabilities include advanced tools and methods for proliferation and terrorism risk assessments to inform fuel cycle development; methods and examples of technical bases for digital instrumentation technologies needed to address diversity and defense-in-depth; or computational suites to support new alloy development that transcend today’s approaches to materials development and testing.

The NEET Crosscutting Technology Development program has five technology subprograms:

1. Reactor Materials
2. Advanced Sensors and Instrumentation
3. Advanced Methods for Manufacturing
4. Proliferation and Terrorism Risk Assessment
5. Nuclear Energy Advanced Modeling Simulation