Kairos Power, which has raised $643m from investors including Google Ventures, the US Energy Department and Samsung C&T, is building the Hermes demonstration reactor, set to be the world's first operational pebble-bed, fluoride salt-cooled high-temperature reactor. The company broke ground on Hermes 2 in April, the first deployment under its deal with Google to help decarbonise data centres in Tennessee and Alabama. In an interview, CTO Edward Blanford explains that its design uses FLiBe molten-salt coolant and TRISO fuel in pebble form, which keeps fission products contained within the fuel and allows lower-pressure plants with less costly containment and more conventional construction. Trade-offs include the need for clean coolant in testing, which requires specialised facilities, and the added cost of lithium-7 enrichment, which Kairos is developing in-house. FLiBe melts at around 459°C but has a wide gap before boiling, and its use requires lithium-7 enriched to 99.995% purity.
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GOOGL
• NeutralAlphabet Inc. (Class A)
Relevance: low
| Market | US stocks |
|---|---|
| Sector | Communication Services |
| Industry | Interactive Media & Services |
| Market cap | $4.3T |
| Close on 10/20/2026 | 340.24 |
| Change that session | -1.14% |
Impact is scored by AI from the headline and may be wrong. It is not investment advice.
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