Canada’s Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, Hon. Navdeep Bains, announced a $20 million investment in Terrestrial Energy to accelerate development of the company’s Integral Molten Salt Reactor (IMSR) power plant.

This is the first such investment from the Strategic Innovation Fund (SIF) announcing support for a Small Modular Reactor (SMR), and is directed to a developer of innovative Generation IV nuclear technology. The company’s IMSR power plant will provide high-efficiency on-grid electricity generation, and its high-temperature operation has many other industry uses, such as zero-carbon hydrogen production.

The funding will assist with Terrestrial Energy’s completion of a key pre-licencing milestone with the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.

In accepting the investment, the company has committed to creating and maintaining 186 jobs and creating 52 CO-OP positions nationally. In addition, Terrestrial Energy is spending at least another $91.5 million in research and development.

The funding announcement comes one week after Ontario Power Generation announced it will advance work with Terrestrial Energy and two other grid-scale SMR developers as part of the utility’s goal to deploy SMR technology.