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1000 results for “Matts_Bytes”
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I just published v0.15 of #OpenAthena for Android
The app now lets you tap any point in a drone image to locate it on the Earth
https://github.com/mkrupczak3/OpenAthenaAndroid/releases
#drones #UAS #cUAS #dronephotography #dronetechnology #dronesar #gis #dualuse #opensource #defensetech
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I've been testing a new "tap to geo-locate" any point in a drone image feature for #OpenAthena for Android.
This feature will be available in v0.15 alpha upon release.
https://github.com/mkrupczak3/OpenAthenaAndroid
#dualuse #searchandrescue #drones #dronetechnology #dronephotography #opensource #Android #Java #DJI #Skydio
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#OpenAthena for Android v0.15 is on its way, with support for geo-locating any arbitrary point in a drone image.
I tested with a Mavic 2 Zoom and Skydio 2 and have been satisfied with the results
The project is free and #opensource
https://github.com/mkrupczak3/OpenAthenaAndroid
#dronephotography #dronetechnology #drones #skydio #dji #searchandrescue #military #dualuse #doctrine #software #Java #Android #androiddev
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The core code of #OpenAthena for Android is under 600 lines of Java, in two files.
Its simplicity is designed to give confidence to #UAS operators in their given domain.
#drone #dronephotography #gis #geodesy #defense #defensetechnology #searchandrescue #sUAS #opensource
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#OpenAthena for Android is coming along well, with some significant UI improvements staged for v0.13.
I'm also currently working on implementing the Cursor on Target message compatible with DoD systems like ATAK
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I made a video demo showing the improved interface and new coordinate system modes in v0.12:
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I just published #OpenAthena for #Android v0.10-pre-alpha. This version significantly improves the user interface.
Get it free here:
https://github.com/mkrupczak3/OpenAthenaAndroid -
#OpenAthena for #Android v0.9-pre-alpha is out now. This version adds support for #Skydio #Autel and #Parrot #drones in addition to #DJI
Get it free at https://OpenAthena.com
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I've been encountering some very troubling results using a #DJI Mavic 2 Air for testing #OpenAthena.
On old firmware versions, the drone incorrectly reports its altitude a few hundred meters below terrain, in both XMP and EXIF metadata
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I just published #OpenAthena for #Android v0.7-pre-alpha. In this version: a click-able link and copy-paste is provided for target location in large font:
https://github.com/mkrupczak3/OpenAthenaAndroid
#drone #DroneSAR #searchandrescue #dronephotography #opensource #programming
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The main project's page describes this technique in more detail:
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Matt Sherratt urges Wales not to ‘die wondering’ against Ireland – The Irish News https://www.byteseu.com/762731/ #EllisMee #Ireland #JoshAdams #MattSherratt #rugbyu #SixNations #UK #Wales
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Labour claims ‘jobs for mates’ as National election candidate appointed to Sport New Zealand board https://www.byteseu.com/1922774/ #aotearoas #appointed #appointment #as #board #candidate #claiming #claims #election #for #giving #Government #Jobs #Labour #mates #national #new #NewZealand #party #proves #Sport #their #to #zealand
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Penn State hires Matt Campbell as Nittany Lions poach longtime Iowa State coach https://www.byteseu.com/1603616/ #AlabamaCrimsonTide #BYUCougars #CollegeFootball #IowaStateCyclones #MattCampbell #MattCampbellIowaStateCoach #PennStateCoachingSearch #PennStateNittanyLions #PennStateTargetsMattCampbell #Sports #ToledoRockets #VirginiaTechHokies
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Fundamentals still favour equities despite geopolitical flux: Matt Orton https://www.byteseu.com/1689203/ #DefenceStocks #EquityMarkets #GeopoliticalTension #Geopolitics #InvestorAdvice #MattOrton #Raymond #TechnologyStocks
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Alex de Minaur, Alexei Popyrin, Jordan Thompson, Matt Ebden Named To Australian Davis Cup Team To Face Belgium In Sydney https://www.byteseu.com/1293604/ #AlexDeMinaur #AlexeiPopyrin #Belgium #DavisCup #JordanThompson #Sydney
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I turn 13 on @codepen in June, so here are my 13 most hearted demos:
1️⃣ 1092 ♥️ #CSS infinite #scroll gallery https://codepen.io/thebabydino/pen/XJrYqGb - my only demo to ever get to 1K ♥️ without being in most hearted of the year first
mostly CSS scroll-driven animations + tiniest bit of JS (~200 bytes for infinity part)
#cssVariables #cssTransforms #coding #code #frontend #cssTransform #3D #web #webDev #webDevelopment #dev #maths #mathematics #geometry #filter
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Saw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=An3QMWg3m1c linked last evening & gave the challenge a quick go myself.
My approach was a mostly #CSS one, with minimal HTML (no extra wrappers) and JS (used only to update top item index, ~200 bytes minified).
While it was working, it wasn't pretty, so today I polished the demo & heavily commented the CSS - check it out on @codepen: https://codepen.io/thebabydino/pen/jENaPjd
#cssGrid #cssSubgrid #cssMaths #Maths #code #coding #frontend #web #dev #webDev #webDevelopment #cssLayout #cssVariables
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Wikidata is a good service, Wikibase (on which Wikidata is built) is a better platform.
I have spoken before about its potential to be added into the file-format registry ecosystem in a federated model.
If we are to use it as a registry that can perhaps complement the pipelines going into PRONOM, e.g. in vendor’s digital preservation platforms such as the Rosetta Format Library, a Wikidata should be able to output different serializations of signature file for tools such as Siegfried, DROID or FIDO.
- Siegfried ✅: https://github.com/richardlehane/siegfried/wiki/Wikidata-identifier
- Fido ❌: I’ll need to revisit this!
And what about DROID?
Conversion to DROID
It’s not straightforward to say to a Wikibase/Wikidata Query Service, “output XML in the shape of a DROID signature file”, but it is straightforward to write a converter script.
I had this very thought last week while presenting with colleagues at a File Format Workshop at iPRES in Ghent.
It dawned on me that the conversion script would actually be simple thanks to a change in format to DROID whereby it can process all its own signatures, where previously it required DROID to pre-process them. It’s a long story, a more simple rendition is that DROID no longer requires DROID byte-code to record information about an identification pattern, and can instead store signatures in the attribute of a byte sequence element as-is, i.e. a PRONOM formatted regular expression from PRONOM itself, or Wikidata.
This realization resulted in my writing a conversion script (it took just over a half-day) during some down-time on the train home this past weekend.
The script is called wddroidy (after WD-40 🙄🥁) and can be found here.
Results
We can see using the skeleton suite from Richard Lehane’s Builder that we can positively identify files using the new signature file.
Links can also be made to work with Wikidata identifiers by modifying the PUID URL pattern in the DROID configuration, e.g. to:
http://wikidata.org/entity/%sThe screenshot below shows where in the dialog that setting is:
Reference signature file
A reference signature file can be found in the wddroidy repository here. There are approximately 8119 file formats listed and 8195 file format signatures for those.
NB. We know there are different issues with Wikidata including how to identify a “format” and the quality of the signatures. We capture some of these in a global repository: https://github.com/ffdev-info/wikidp-issues/issues
DROID simplified format
The real headline here might be how easy it was to create the output using the DROID simplified format.
I have spoken about it briefly before but not in any detail.
In-short DROID no longer uses its own byte-code encoding that included strange terms such as
DefaultShift, Shift Byte, andSubSequence(instructions to DROID about how to perform Boyer Moore Horspool search). See below and note especially how the bytes are split inShift Byteattributes and elements:<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><FFSignatureFile xmlns="http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pronom/SignatureFile" Version="1" DateCreated="2024-09-23T18:16:09+00:00"> <InternalSignatureCollection> <InternalSignature ID="1" Specificity="Specific"> <ByteSequence Reference="BOFoffset"> <SubSequence MinFragLength="0" Position="1" SubSeqMaxOffset="0" SubSeqMinOffset="0"> <Sequence>255044462D312E34</Sequence> <DefaultShift>9</DefaultShift> <Shift Byte="25">8</Shift> <Shift Byte="50">7</Shift> <Shift Byte="44">6</Shift> <Shift Byte="46">5</Shift> <Shift Byte="2D">4</Shift> <Shift Byte="31">3</Shift> <Shift Byte="2E">2</Shift> <Shift Byte="34">1</Shift> </SubSequence> </ByteSequence> </InternalSignature> </InternalSignatureCollection> <FileFormatCollection> <FileFormat ID="1" Name="Development Signature" PUID="dev/1" Version="1.0" MIMEType="application/octet-stream"> <InternalSignatureID>1</InternalSignatureID> <Extension>ext</Extension> </FileFormat> </FileFormatCollection></FFSignatureFile>
The updated format was made possible via Matt Palmer via his ByteSeek work, and can now except a regularly encoded PRONOM formatted regular expression (regex) in an attribute in the
ByteSequenceelement. See here for a signature file equivalent to the above:<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><FFSignatureFile xmlns="http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pronom/SignatureFile" Version="1" DateCreated="2024-09-23T18:16:09+00:00"> <InternalSignatureCollection> <InternalSignature ID="1" Specificity="Specific"> <ByteSequence Reference="BOFoffset" Sequence="255044462D312E34" Offset="0" /> </InternalSignature> </InternalSignatureCollection> <FileFormatCollection> <FileFormat ID="1" Name="Development Signature" PUID="dev/1" Version="1.0" MIMEType="application/octet-stream"> <InternalSignatureID>1</InternalSignatureID> <Extension>ext</Extension> </FileFormat> </FileFormatCollection></FFSignatureFile>
The format is much easier to read, and after a bit of time sitting with the DROID signature file format you realize it is fairly easy to output as well. I use some very rudimentary templates in wddroidy using Python’s f-strings.
It means other sources of PRONOM encoded signatures can output much simpler signature files and they can be used by DROID. I myself need to add it to the signature development utility – this would allow the utility to run standalone on anyone’s PC.
One next step for this approach might be to confirm that it does work entirely as expected by extracting all of PRONOM’s signatures proper and performing a mapping to the simplified format – if we can match against all the skeleton files in the latest Builder release then we should be looking good!
Priorities
I am always reminded, but always forget about priorities! This is part of how DROID resolves a file format into a single identifier, e.g. where SVG can match XML, we often want the more specific format returned, and so a priority is used to prioritize that one over the other, resulting in a single unambiguous identification for the DROID user. It manifests in the signature file as:
<FileFormat ID="634" MIMEType="image/svg+xml"Name="Scalable Vector Graphics"PUID="fmt/91"Version="1.0"><InternalSignatureID>24</InternalSignatureID><Extension>svg</Extension><HasPriorityOverFileFormatID>638</HasPriorityOverFileFormatID></FileFormat>More work needs to be done with Wikidata to understand if priorities can be properly applied to a DROID signature file. They are not written into the reference signature file above.Using the results
Using the results can be done for two things:
- (Probably) There are a greater number of patterns in the Wikidata output than in PRONOM. If you have a file that remains unidentified, you can try the reference file for clues as to what it may be. I’d only use caution and investigate the exact byte sequence used for a match and understand its properties. I’d also check that the mapping also looks accurate, I’ve tried one or two runs using the identifier and it looks good, but there may still be mistakes.
- For improving the quality of the sources in Wikidata. As you can see from the Skeleton suite there are a lot of gaps. We a) have a rough idea what these are, and b) know the identification doesn’t work via Wikidata. Why is that? Is the signature in Wikidata simply not good enough? Are patterns missing? Is there another error or issue we can help with given our expertise in file format identification?
Hacking wddroidy
You can hack wddroidy. Currently it allows you to limit the number of results returned, and also modify the ISO language code used by the tool. You can see this in the command line arguments:
python wddroidy.py --helpusage: wddroidy [-h] [--definitions DEFINITIONS] [--wdqs] [--lang LANG] [--limit LIMIT] [--output OUTPUT] [--output-date] [--endpoint ENDPOINT]create a DROID compatible signature file from Wikidataoptions: -h, --help show this help message and exit --definitions DEFINITIONS use a local definitions file, e.g. from Siegfried --wdqs, -w live results from Wikidata --lang LANG, -l LANG change Wikidata language results --limit LIMIT, -n LIMIT limit the number of resukts --output OUTPUT, -o OUTPUT filename to output to --output-date, -t output a default file with the current timestamp --endpoint ENDPOINT, -url ENDPOINT url of the WDQSfor more information visit https://github.com/ross-spencer/wddroidy
The actual SPARQL query used can be manually edited in the src folder. E.g. you can limit the query by format or family or classification. I provide some more inspiration in the Siegfried Wiki.
Let me know if it’s useful!
This is really just a quick hack and it needs a lot more testing to improve the quality of the output. Most can be dealt with on the Wikidata side I am sure, but some might need to be done in the tool. If it’s useful, reach out, and let’s discuss what can be changed or how it can be used in your work.
Data quality
It will quickly become apparent the data quality isn’t what it is with PRONOM and that is why a curated and authoritative service such as PRONOM is always going to be needed. As mentioned in previous talks, this can in theory be complemented with downstream data in federated databases. This might mean curating Wikidata better using some of the tools available, or curating data into a Wikibase (the platfom Wikidata is built upon). Both options bring different benefits and advantages such as creating a bigger tent of signature developers on Wikidata, or, another example, more expressive signatures being made available via federated Wikibases.
And a word on Wikiba.se
A reminder too, that setting up a Wikibase can take some effort (I was once running three at the same time 😬) but a service called https://wikiba.se/ exists. wikiba.se could form an excellent scratch pad to begin thinking about mapping PRONOM like data to a Wikibase and also begin solving some of the other issues around mapping container signatures and outputting those in a way that is compatible for DROID. Let me know if you give it a whirl, or want to collab on any of that.
Otherwise, thanks in advance! And enjoy wddroidy!
https://exponentialdecay.co.uk/blog/making-droid-work-with-wikidata/
#Code #Coding #digipres #DigitalPreservation #DROID #FileFormat #FileFormats #OpenData #PRONOM #siegfried #SoftwareDevelopment #wikidata
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If you’ve never heard of NIST SP 800-108 before, or NIST Special Publications in general, here’s a quick primer:
Special Publications are a type of publication issued by NIST. Specifically, the SP 800-series reports on the Information Technology Laboratory’s research, guidelines, and outreach efforts in computer security, and its collaborative activities with industry, government, and academic organizations. These documents often support FIPS (Federal Information Protection Standards).
Via NIST.gov
One of the NIST 800-series documents concerned with Key Derivation using Pseudorandom Functions is NIST SP 800-108, first published in 2009.
In October 2021, NIST published a draft update to NIST SP 800-108 and opened a comment period until January 2022. This update mostly included Keccak-based Message Authentication Codes (KMAC) in addition to the incumbent standardized designs (HMAC and CMAC).
Upon reviewing a proposal for NIST SP 800-108 revision 1 after its comment period opened, Amazon’s cryptographers discovered a novel security issue with the standard.
I was a co-author of the public comment that disclosed this issue, along with Matthew Campagna, Panos Kampanakis, and Adam Petcher, but take no credit for its discovery.
Consequently, Section 6.7 was added to the final revision 1 of the standard to address Key Control Security.
This post examines the attack against the initial SP 800-108 design when AES-CMAC is used as the PRF in KDF Counter mode.
This meme is the TL;DR of this blog postPreliminaries
(If you’re in a hurry, feel free to skip to the attack.)
NIST SP 800-108 specifies a “KDF in Counter Mode” that can be used with several PRFs, including AES-CMAC. It’s worth noting that this family of KDFs can be defined to use any arbitrary PRF, but only the PRFs approved by NIST for this use are recommended.
AES-CMAC is a one-key CBC-MAC construction. Some cryptographers, such as Matt Green, are famously not fond of CBC-MAC.
KDF Security and PRF Security
Yes, I will take any excuse to turn cryptography knowledge into wholesome memes.KDF stands for “Key Derivation Function”.
PRF stands for “Pseudo-Random Function”.
The security notion for KDF Security is stronger than PRF Security.
PRFs require a uniformly-distributed secret key, while KDFs can tolerate a key that is not uniformly random.
This matters if you’re, say, trying to derive symmetric encryption keys from a Diffie-Hellman shared secret of some sort, where the output of your DH() function has some algebraic structure.
Realistically, the difference between the two security notions matters a lot less in scenarios where you’re deriving sub-keys from a primary uniformly random cryptographic secret.
However, it does make your proofs nicer to achieve KDF security instead of merely PRF security.
Key Control Security
Let’s pretend, for simplicity, we have a generic
KDF()function that offers KDF Security. We don’t need to know how it works just yet.Because KDFs are thought of as PRFs, but stronger, it seems perfectly reasonable that you could use
KDF()in a setup where multiple inputs are provided, each from a different party, and the output would always be uniformly random.Further, even if all other parties’ inputs are known, it should remain computationally infeasible for one of the parties to influence the output of
KDF()to produce a specific value; e.g. a key with all bits zeroed.The assumption that this result is computationally infeasible when working with
KDF()is referred to as “Key Control Security”.Loss of Key Control Security in NIST SP 800-108
You already know where this is going…I’m going to explain the attack by way of example.
If you want a more formal treatment, I believe Appendix B of NIST SP 800-108 rev 1 has what you’re looking for.
Imagine that you’re designing an online two-party private messaging app. To ensure forward secrecy, you implement a forward-secure KDF ratchet, loosely inspired by Signal’s design.
For your KDF, you choose AES-CMAC in Counter Mode, because you’re designing for hardware that has accelerated AES instructions and want to avoid the overhead of hash functions.
(Aside: I guess this would also imply you’re most likely selecting AES-CCM for your actual message encryption.)
With each message, the sender commits some random bytes by encrypting them with their message. The recipient, after verifying the authentication tag and decrypting the message, possess knowledge of the same random bytes.
Both parties then use the random bytes and the current symmetric key to ratchet forward to a new 128-bit symmetric key.
The million dollar question is: Is this ratcheting protocol secure?
In the case of KDF in Counter Mode with AES-CMAC, if you have more than 16 bytes of input material, the answer is simply: No.
How The Attack Works
A two-block implementation of this KDF is normally computed as follows:
- Return
Don’t get intimidated by the notation. This is just AES encryption and XOR.
The messages and are defined in the KDF specification. In the scenario we sketched above, we assume the attacker can choose these arbitrarily.
To coerce a recipient to use an arbitrary 128-bit value (i.e., ) all an attacker needs to do is:
- Calculate
- Let some value
- Here, is the target value.
- Force
Notice that is the result of encrypting , and our attacker’s goal in step 3 can be achieved solely by manipulating (which exists independent of )?
That’s the vulnerability.
The public comments and Appendix B on the NIST document describe the actual steps of computing to force a chosen , which involve manipulating the structure of to achieve this result.
Feel free to check out both documents if you’re interested in the finer details.
What Can An Attacker Actually Do With This?
If an attacker controls both and …
Or if an attacker knows some and can control …
…then they can force the final KDF output to equal whatever 128-bit value they want you to use.
The most straightforward application of the loss of key control security is to introduce a backdoor into an application.
If the Underhanded Crypto Contest were still running this year, NIST SP 800-108 using AES-CMAC in Counter Mode would be an excellent basis for a contestant.
Does Anyone Actually Use NIST SP 800-108 This Way?
I’m not aware of any specific products or services that use this KDF in this way. I will update this section if someone finds any.
Is This A Deliberate Backdoor in a NIST Standard?
No.
I understand that, in the wake of Dual_EC_DRBG, there is a lot of distrust for NIST’s work on standardized cryptography.
However, I have no specific knowledge to indicate this was placed deliberately in the standard.
It is inaccurate to describe the loss of key control security in this context as a backdoor. Instead, it’s an unexpected property of the algorithms that can be used to create a clever backdoor. These are wildly different propositions.
At least, that was the case until it was disclosed to NIST in January 2022. 🙂
(I’m including an answer to this question, preemptively, in case someone overreacts when I publish this blog post. I hope it proves unnecessary, but I figured some caution was warranted.)
Mitigation Options
If you care about Key Control Security and use NIST SP 800-108, you should use HMAC or KMAC instead of CMAC. Only CMAC is impacted.
Revision 1 of NIST SP800-108 also outlines another mitigation that involves changing the inputs to include an additional (but reusable) PRF output for every block.
This tweak does change makes the KDF behave more like our intuition for PRFs, but in my opinion it’s better to avoid using CMAC entirely for KDFs.
Why Wasn’t This Widely Publicized?
As interesting and surprising as the loss of Key Control Security in a NIST standard is to cryptography nerds, it’s not exactly like Heartbleed or Log4shell.
That said, regardless of your personal feelings on NIST, if you’re interesting in not having findings like this slip through the cracks in the future, it’s generally worthwhile to pay attention to what NIST is up to.
https://scottarc.blog/2024/06/04/attacking-nist-sp-800-108/
#cybersecurity #framework #KDF #KDFSecurity #KeyDerivationFunctions #NIST #NISTSP800108 #PRFSecurity #security #standards #symmetricCryptography
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The Pico bit-banged #Transputer link works! At a staggeringly-fast 96 bytes/second! If I remove the oversampling receiver it could go 16x that, and I could run the timer interrupt 10x faster - but that would max the CPU out. This is good enough for a proof of concept release. PIO later. Still got to do another link implementation over a USB-CDC interface, and route logging over a separate one, then wire all this into the emulator. Looking tight to release by the solstice :(
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Day 22 of Advent of Compiler Optimisations!
Comparing a string_view against "ABCDEFG" should call memcmp, right? Watch what Clang actually generates — no function call at all, just a handful of inline instructions using some rather cunning tricks. How does it compare 7 bytes so efficiently when they don't fit in a single register?
Read more: https://xania.org/202512/22-memory-cunningness
Watch: https://youtu.be/kXmqwJoaapg -
- DOE Awards Six HALEU Fuel Contracts
- Urenco Boosts US Enrichment Capacity
- US Navy Releases RFI for Nuclear Power at Seven Sites
- US Gov’t Wants to Re-start More Nuclear Reactors
- Blue Energy Secures $45M to Build Underwater SMRs for Data Center Power
- Zap Energy Lands $130M in New Capital
- General Atomics Releases FUSE ~ Open Source Fusion Software
DOE Awards Six HALEU Fuel Contracts for Fuel Advanced Reactors
- High-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU – 5-20% U235) is for use by advanced reactors
- The contracts will allow companies to compete for work to provide deconversion services
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) awarded contracts to six companies to spur the buildout of a U.S. supply chain for fuels for advanced nuclear reactors. Many advanced reactors will require high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) to achieve smaller designs, longer operating cycles, and increased efficiencies over current technologies.
These contracts will allow selected companies to bid on work for deconversion services, a critical component of the HALEU supply chain. Deconversion transforms the gaseous form of enriched uranium (uranium hexafluoride aka UF6) into either uranium oxide or uranium metal forms for fabrication into solid fuel elements intended for specific reactors.
The United States currently lacks commercial HALEU enrichment and deconversion services to support the deployment of advanced reactors. DOE also plans to award contracts for enrichment services to support the full breadth of the HALEU supply chain.
Progress towards commercialization of advanced reactors has been delayed by the lack of access to reliable supplies of HALEU. For instance, TerraPower, which is developing a 345 MW sodium cooled advanced reactor, funded in part with a cost shared contract with DOE, has postponed its startup date by two years to 2030 due to delays in getting HALEU fuel.
Selected companies awarded HALEU contracts include: BWXT, Centrus, Framatome, GE Vernova, Orano, and Westinghouse. In terms of market shares, the six companies will each receive a minimum contract of $2 million, with up to $800 million available for deconversion services over the 10-year contract period.
Cumulatively, the firms are expected to deliver 290 tonnes of fuel (638,000 lbs) during the decade long period of performance. DOE said in 2023 it has immediate needs for 22 metric tonnes of HALEU for first fuel loads of the advanced reactors it has funded including TerraPower and X-Energy.
The firms bring different capabilities to the program.
- Centrus through its enrichment operation began producing HALEU fuel last year under a DOE contract in the form of uranium hexafluoride (UF6). To be used in a reactor, the gaseous form of the fuel must be converted to either uranium oxide or uranium metal fuel and fabricated as solid nuclear fuel elements to meet the needs of specific customers.
- Orano has the capability to carry out the deconversion process from gas to oxide. The firm announced plans in September to build a multi-billion dollar uranium enrichment plant in Oak Ridge, TN. Once built and in production Orano says the plant will produce commercial quantities of low enriched uranium up to 5% U235 and some with higher enrichment levels up to 8% U235. The firm has not indicated, at least for now, that it has any plans to produce enriched uranium for use in HALEU fuel, e.g., 9-20% U235.
The other four firms – BWX Technologies, Framatome, GE Vernova, and Westinghouse – are positioned as fuel fabrication firms with a wide range of capabilities.
- BWXT inked a contract in August 2023 with DOE’s NNSA to produce HALEU from “scrap” materials” to produce 2 metric tonnes (4,400 lbs) of HALEU.
- Framatome last May announced a deal with TerraPower to produce HALEU at its Richland, WA, fuel fabrication plant. It will convert uranium oxide into uranium metal for eventual use in TerraPower’s 345 MW sodium cooled advanced reactor which the firm is building in Wyoming.
- In 2022 Global Fuel Americas (GE Verona) announced a $200 million deal with TerraPower to fabricate HALEU uranium metal fuel for the firm’s advanced reactor. In July 2023
- Westinghouse announced the UK government’s nuclear fuel fund had awarded the firm $11 million to upgrade its Springfields nuclear fuel production plant in the UK to produce HALEU as well as to produce accident tolerant fuels for light water reactors.
More information on the HALEU Availability Program can be found at HALEU Availability Program | Department of Energy.
& & &
Urenco Boosts US Enrichment Capacity
Urenco has installed the first new centrifuges of an expansion project in the United States, which is on track to be deliver additional capacity next year. The centrifuges are installed in an existing centrifuge hall at the company’s enrichment site in Eunice, New Mexico.
The project will provide an approximately 15% increase in enrichment capacity at the site, providing an additional 700,000 SWU per year. Urenco USA is on schedule to begin producing enriched uranium from newly installed centrifuges in 2025.
The site’s expansion project is the first to be delivered under Urenco’s capacity expansion program, and will strengthen the nuclear fuel supply chain both in the U.S. and globally. In total, under Urenco’s current expansion, an additional 1.8 million SWU will be delivered across three projects, including two others at Urenco’s sites in Germany and the Netherlands.
Urenco’s Eunice, NM, site is the only commercial enrichment facility in the U.S. In 2023, its annual production was 4.4 million SWU. The site has the physical space and the NRC license to further expand its annual production up to 10 million SWU. The firm has not announced plans to produce HALEU fuels at levels of enrichment for between 9-20% U235.
Urenco CEO, Boris Schucht, said, ““This is only the latest step. We are intending to further expand our capacity in the U.S., subject to market needs, as the strong momentum in the nuclear industry continues.”
& & &
US Navy Releases RFI for Nuclear Power at Seven Sites
The Department of the Navy has released a Request for Information (RFI) to industry, seeking to explore concepts for the development of nuclear power facilities aimed at enhancing energy security at seven Navy and Marine Corps installations in the United States.
The RFI’s goal is to collect input for privately-funded concepts that would ensure continuous operational capability of Navy installations in the event of grid power outages, adversary attacks, extreme weather events, or other disruptions. At the same time it will improve utility and regional grid capacity, flexibility, affordability and resilience to support continuity of services.
According to the RFI installation reliance / tactical readiness are a top priorities for the Navy “to achieve full resilience and operational continuity.”
“We welcome input from developers, utilities, and consortia on innovative approaches that may include, but are not limited to, Shore Based Nuclear Technologies and other advanced technologies.”
“Contractors who own or operate nuclear power sites on Navy or USMC installations would be responsible for the possession, storage and management of nuclear and spent fuel, as well as complying with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission licensing requirements.”
Locations Of Interest
- Virginia
– Naval Air Station (NAS) Oceana (VA)
– Naval Support Activity (NSA) South Potomac (includes Naval Support Facility (NSF)
– Dahlgren, VA and
– Naval Weapons Station (NWS) Yorktown (VA)
– Marine Corps Base (MCB) Quantico (VA)- Maryland
– NAS Patuxent River (MD)
– NSF Indian Head, MD)North Carolina
– Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) Cherry Point (NC)
– MCB Camp Lejeune (NC)Nuclear reactors, including small modular reactors (SMRs) and microreactors, have the potential to provide defense installations with resilient energy for several years, even in the face of physical or cyberattacks, extreme weather, pandemics, biothreats, and other emerging challenges that could disrupt commercial energy networks.
This announcement builds on recent Department of Defense initiatives in this area, including an announcement earlier this year by the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Installations, Energy, and Environment regarding the release of an RFI last June to support a deployment program for advanced reactors to power multiple Army sites across the United States.
In related congressional testimony, the Secretary of the Army, Christine Wormuth, stated: “We are certainly very focused on energy and resilience at our installations and being able to operate in a more resilient manner. We are interested in the potential of micro reactors.”
This effort is also complemented by other initiatives, such as the Department of the Air Force’s microreactor pathfinder project at Eielson AFB and the Office of the Secretary of Defense Strategic Capabilities Office Project Pele, a transportable microreactor prototype that recently broke ground at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory.
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US Gov’t Wants to Re-start More Nuclear Reactors
Reuters reports that White House climate adviser Ali Zaidi said last week the Biden administration is working on plans to bring additional shut down nuclear power reactors back online to help meet soaring demand for emissions-free electricity needed to power AI related data centers. (Image: Microsoft Bing Image Creator)
He referenced two projects including the planned recommissioning of Holtec’s Palisades nuclear plant in Michigan and the potential restart of a unit at Constellation Energy’s Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania.
Asked if additional shuttered plants could be restarted, Zaidi said: “We’re working on it in a very concrete way. There are two that I can think of.”
Zaidi declined to identify the two power plants or provide further details about the effort.
One of the likely restarts is the Duane Arnold plant in Iowa which faces expensive repairs. On August 10, 2020, the plant cooling towers were damaged during a severe storm and repairs were assessed to be uneconomical, as the plant had was scheduled for decommissioning in October 2020. The operator and majority owner is NextEra Energy Resources (70%). The Central Iowa Power Cooperative owns 20% and the Corn Belt Power Cooperative owns 10%.
In Iowa NextERA CEO John Ketchum, said that the firm will consider reopening the plant to meet the demand for power from data centers. Ketchum told Bloomberg on June 12th he had inquiries from potential data center customers interested in the 600 MW of power that could be provided by the reactor. Google and other data center users are building computing facilities in Iowa and will need power to run them.
“I would consider it, if it could be done safely and on budget.”
Another possible candidate is Indian Point Energy Center – located north of New York city in Buchanan, NY. It is now owned for the purpose of decommissioning by Holtec International. It isn’t clear how much work has been done so far or whether the decommissioning work has gone past the point that would prevent the reactor from being restarted.
Holtec said on its website that Indian Point’s fuel has been removed from the reactor vessel and placed in the spent fuel pool to cool. An April 2024 technical briefing shows significant work to decommission the twin reactors is underway.
Indian Point’s reactors, which each generated 1,000 MW of power, were shut down as a result of intense political pressure from New York State’s then governor Andrew Cuomo due to the extraordinary influence of green groups who’s support was essential to his re-election. The reactor’s capacity has since been partially replaced by natural gas plants.
Three-prong Nuclear Strategy
Speaking at the Reuters IMPACT conference in New York, Zaidi said repowering existing dormant nuclear plants was part of a three-pronged strategy of President Joe Biden’s administration to bring more nuclear power online to fight climate change and boost production.
The other two prongs include development of small modular reactors (SMRs) for certain applications, and continuing development of next generation, advanced nuclear reactors.
Biden has called for a tripling of U.S. nuclear power capacity to respond to energy demand that is accelerating in part due to expansion of power hungry technologies like artificial intelligence and cloud computing.
Last week, the Biden administration said it closed a $1.52 billion loan to restart the Palisades nuclear plant in Michigan, which would take at least two years to re-open.
Constellation and Microsoft signed a power deal last month but the Redmond, WA, computer giant will only pay for power once the reactor is running. Constellation hopes it will receive government support based on its expected request to the DOE Loan Program Office for a similar level of financial support that was given to Holtec at Palisades.
Zaidi told the conference that the U.S. Navy had requested information to build SMRs on a half dozen bases. “SMR is a technology that is not a decades-away play. It’s one that companies in the United States are looking to deploy in this decade.”
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Blue Energy Secures $45M to Build Underwater SMRs for Data Center Power
Blue Energy, a nuclear power plant company, emerged from stealth mode with a $45 million Series A funding. The investors were co-led by Engine Ventures and At One Ventures, with investment from Angular Ventures, Tamarack Global, Propeller Ventures, Starlight Ventures, and Nucleation Capital. The firm is a spinoff from MIT.
Blue Energy introduced its modular nuclear power plant that can be centrally manufactured in existing shipyards. Shipyard manufacturing reduces the cost and build time of deploying nuclear power safely, making nuclear power economically competitive with fossil fuels and renewables. The funding will be used to advance Blue Energy’s core engineering work and site development, and secure additional partners.
Blue Energy said it is reactor agnostic, partnering with reactor vendors and designing modular power plants to house them. By partnering with reactor vendors, Blue Energy can leverage existing regulatory progress to further accelerate the time to market for their modular nuclear power plant.
Blue Energy says it will use mature light water reactor designs and the latest passive safety advancements to create a plant that is 100% walk-away safe. The reactor building is submerged in a pool that provides additional physical protection and backup cooling. The firm says customers can start with one reactor and add additional reactors over time.
Multi-unit underwater reactor complex – Image: Blue Energy
The reactor and passive safety functions are fully isolated from the rest of the power plant, allowing the turbine hall and other non-nuclear systems to be manufactured in non-nuclear shipyards.
Candidate SMR Scale Reactors
The prospects of sinking an entire nuclear reactor into the ocean or other large body of water immediately brings to mind the question of size. Small modular reactors, with less than 300 MW of generating capability, are plausible candidates for this approach to avoiding the need for a containment structure to protect against airplane crashes or drone attacks.
In the US only NuScale, as a LWR type SMR, has completed the NRC licensing process for its 50 MW SMR. A 77 MW SMR upgrade is expected to be approved by the NRC.
Two other LWR type designs are the GE-Hitachi BWRX300 and the Holtect SMR300. Both designs are in pre-licensing status with the NRC and are seen as completing that effort by the end of this decade or early 2030s. Westinghouse recently announced its AP300, a scaled down version of its PWR type AP1000, but work on licensing the design has just gotten underway.
In the UK the Rolls Royce 470 MW, a PWR, is making its way through the UK Office of Nuclear Regulation (ONR) generic design assessment process (GDA), which can take up to four years to complete. The firm is hoping for near term funding for its mid-size PWR from the UK government and has been pushing the for it as being the ‘home town’ team in the UK to gain an edge in the competition for SMR funding sponsored by the government.
For its part, the UK agency responsible for making the funding award has dithered repeatedly in terms of choosing one or more winners. The ministry named four short list contenders last month eliminating NuScale. In the next stage of the procurement process bidders will be invited to enter negotiations with GBN for funding and contract awards. EDF withdrew its SMR entry from the competition citing the need for further design work.
China is building its ACP100 small modular reactor demonstration project at the Changjiang site on China’s island province of Hainan. According to World Nuclear News, it has been under development since 2010. The 125 MWe ACP100 integrated PWR’s preliminary design was completed in 2014. In 2016, the design became the first SMR to pass a safety review by the International Atomic Energy Agency. So far China National Nuclear Corporation has not announced plans to export the design.
In South Korea the SMART100 small modular reactor design has been granted standard design approval by South Korea’s Nuclear Safety and Security Commission.
The Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute (KAERI), Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power (KHNP) and Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah City for Atomic and Renewable Energy (KA-CARE) applied for standard design approval of the SMART100 in December 2019. The Nuclear Safety and Security Commission (NSSC) began its review of the application in August 2021. The NSSC announced it has now granted standard design approval for the reactor.
SMART is a 330 MWt pressurized water reactor with integral steam generators and advanced safety features. The unit is designed for electricity generation (up to 100 MWe) as well as thermal applications, such as seawater desalination, with a 60-year design life and three-year refueling cycle.
Business Case
The business case promoted by the firm is that there is no required upfront capital investment from customers. Blue Energy finances, builds, owns, and operates its power plants. Customers buy new nuclear megawatts through risk-managed power purchase agreements.
The firm posted on its website that it projects it can build its reactors in two years and deliver power from them at $5/kw.
“Blue Energy is addressing the biggest obstacles to wide adoption of nuclear power: cost and build time. Using the traditional approach, it takes thousands of workers several years to construct nuclear power plants on site. We’ve designed a modular plant that can be fully prefabricated centrally in shipyards and transported to its operating location,” said Jake Jurewicz, CEO of Blue Energy.
About Blue Energy
Blue Energy was founded by Jake Jurewicz, based in Edinburgh, and Matt Slotkin, located in the New York city metro area.
Jurewicz previously co-founded Entropy Power and served on the corporate strategy team at Exelon Corporation. He holds a Masters in Nuclear Science & Engineering, and a dual Bachelors in Physics and Nuclear Science & Engineering from MIT, where he did his thesis on shipyard construction of offshore nuclear power plants.
Slotkin previously co-founded Vowel, an AI/video company acquired by Zapier, and led engineering in the Systemized Intelligence Lab at Bridgewater Associates. He graduated from Yale University in 2011 with a degree in economics and spent a year studying at Tsinghua University. He is fluent in Chinese.
Blue Energy’s leadership team also includes Chief Commercial Officer and Corporate Counsel Tom O’Neill, the former General Counsel and Vice President of Licensing at Exelon. CJ Fong, formerly Chief of Staff to NRC Commissioner Wright and NRC staff for 23 years, joins Blue Energy as VP of Regulatory. Charlie Bowser, who engineered, built and commissioned the NETPower pilot plant, joins as SVP of Engineering.
Blue Energy said in a press statement it has signed a letter of intent with an un-named datacenter and cloud provider to serve as the offtaker for the first plant. The firmis hiring and lists open positions for offices in Edinburgh, Scotland, and Bethesda, MD. The locations indicate a possible interest in both US and European markets.
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Zap Energy Lands $130M in New Capital
- Demo power plant system begins operations and aims for first milestone. Total funding now at $330M
- Zap Energy is building a test platform for liquid metals and other key fusion energy technologies
Zap’s $130 million Series D was led by Soros Fund Management LLC, with participation by new investors that include BAM Elevate, Emerson Collective, Leitmotif, Mizuho Financial Group, Plynth Energy and Xplor Ventures.
Current investors participating in the new round include Addition, Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Chevron Technology Ventures, DCVC, Energy Impact Partners, Lowercarbon Capital and Shell Ventures.
The new funding will be used to continue parallel development of both plasma R&D and systems-level plant engineering and integration, including the next generation in the company’s FuZE device series and a cutting-edge pulsed power capacitor bank. The firm is located in San Diego, CA.
The team is now attempting to reach a milestone outlined as part of the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Milestone-Based Fusion Development Program, and hopes to do so by the end of the year.
“The race for fusion commercialization has historically been thought of as a triathlon: science, then engineering, then commercialization,” says Zap CEO Benj Conway.
“But at Zap, we’re attempting to swim, cycle and run at the same time – such a parallel approach is key to delivering commercial fusion on a timescale that matters. Century is a vital part of the engineering leg and we’re quickly coming up to speed.”
According the company supplied information Zap Energy is building a low-cost, compact and scalable fusion energy platform that confines and compresses plasma without magnetic coils or high-power lasers. Zap’s sheared-flow-stabilized Z-pinch technology provides fusion economics and requires orders of magnitude less capital than conventional approaches.
About Century
Century is the world’s first 100-kilowatt-scale repetitive Z-pinch system. Its goal is to integrate and test three major aspects of Zap’s power design: repetitive pulsed power supplies, plasma-facing circulating liquid metal walls, and technology for mitigating electrode damage.
Century is designed to simulate plant-like operation by firing high-voltage pulses of power every ten seconds in a steady sequence for more than two hours (>1,000 pulses at 0.1 Hz). (Zap Energy image)
It is circulating 70 kilograms of hot liquid bismuth in its initial configuration and well over a ton in its final configuration. Air-cooled heat exchangers will remove the intense plasma heat absorbed by the liquid metal. The firm is testing critical strategies for mitigating electrode damage due to extreme heat and neutron flux.
“Zap’s fusion approach is pulsed, so ultimately it will run like an internal combustion engine with cylinders firing all day long to produce steady energy output,” explains Thompson.
“As you do that you also generate large neutron flux and heat loads in the system over time, which is exactly the energy output that you want, but requires unique engineering solutions. Century will test a lot of our assumptions and define the best path toward our first plant.”
Next year the platform will gradually ramp to 100 kilowatts of average input power. For comparison, the 100 kilowatts that drives Century is roughly equal to taking the average power draw of 75 U.S. homes and concentrating it into a chamber the size of a hot water heater.
Century, with a central stack about the size of a double-decker bus, is close to the eventual size of a single Zap Energy module that will produce 50 megawatts of electricity. Future power plants will have multiple modules.
Founded in 2o17 the firm’s collaborators include the University of Washington, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, UC Berkeley, Los Alamos National Laboratory, UC San Diego, University of Nevada, Reno, TransAlta A
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General Atomics Releases FUSE ~ Open Source Fusion Software
- A Powerful Tool to Fast-Track the Development of Fusion Power Plants
- New Open-Source Software Aims to Drive Fusion Innovation for a Clean Energy Future
This month San Diego, CA, General Atomics (GA) took a big step towards achieving this goal by releasing the Fusion Synthesis Engine (FUSE)—a state-of-the-art, open-source software designed to help build fusion power plants.
Created by GA, the software is now accessible to anyone under the Apache 2.0 license, guaranteeing its free usage, modification, and commercialization. Written in “Julia”, a popular programming language, FUSE combines key elements needed to develop fusion power—such as plasma physics, engineering, and cost analysis—into one easy-to-use system.
GA developers explained that other researchers can easily install and run the program on their own systems, enabling more effective collaboration on fusion energy projects. This approach helps reduce costs and makes it easier to achieve the goal of fusion energy.
By integrating various complex models, researchers can generate simulations that are both faster and more accurate, including how a fusion plant operates in both steady and dynamic conditions.
“Releasing FUSE is a bold and exciting step that offers a powerful tool to the entire fusion community,” said Wayne Solomon, vice president of Magnetic Fusion Energy for the General Atomics Energy Group.
“This platform encourages teamwork and new ideas while fulfilling GA’s commitment to openness and progress. By making FUSE available to everyone, we’re not just advancing our own developments—we’re giving others the ability to build on it, with the goal of accelerating discoveries throughout the entire field.”
“FUSE could have a big impact on the future of fusion energy,” said Orso Meneghini, a theory and computational science manager for the General Atomics Energy Group.
“One of its strengths is that it uses machine learning to speed up simulations, making it useful for improving plant designs and reducing uncertainties. Overall, Fuse’s flexibility and generality make it an important tool for advancing research in this critical area of energy research.”
GA also operates the DIII-D National Fusion Facility, a Department of Energy user facility that houses the only operating fusion reactor (tokamak) in the U.S., where scientists collaborate to find the best solutions for bringing fusion power to market.
For more information and full documentation about FUSE, visit https://fuse.help
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https://neutronbytes.com/2024/10/12/doe-awards-six-haleu-fuel-contracts-for-advanced-reactors/
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Made a funky normal-map thing in HTML/JS. Source code is available!
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Today I am thankful for developers of #CookieBanners that can be closed with the escape button. I know you didn't want to make that eldritch horror of a #UI, but you made it slightly more bearable.
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TIL that on macOS, clicking the active application in the dock will rotate focus between its open windows. 🤯
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30.marts Rūjienas mežā. Zied baltais vizbulis. Lido taureņi, bites, ir aktīvas skudras un citi kukaiņi. Arī ceļmalā tika pamanīta pirmā varde.
#mežs #forest #pavasaris #spring #nature #daba #naturephotography #latvija #latvia #lv
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#ByteJamuary 3: "Aliases - Keep it snappy"
Lua allows you to assign functions to variables which gives us a neat little trick to keep your maths code tidier!
https://bytejamuary.creativenucleus.com/blog/3-aliases/
(I did briefly release this as part of Day 2 yesterday, but decided I was better off splitting it!)
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Australian Chef Matt Moran To Explore Personal Lives Of Richard Roxburgh, Pia Miranda & More In Food And History Series ‘Memory Bites’ From Big Owl Pictures & Private Investment Firm Globe Wealth
#News #AlexandraJakob #Australia #Formats #MattMoran #MemoryBiteswithMattMoran #SBS #ShaunMurphyhttps://deadline.com/2024/10/memory-bites-matt-moran-sbs-series-1236161899/