Fugen was one of those reactors that makes you stop and say, “Well…THAT’s different.”

Built at Tsuruga, Japan, Fugen was a prototype 557 MWth/148 MWe Advanced Thermal Reactor (ATR)

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Nuclear history has an awkward "middle child" phase that the big-utility PR machines usually pretend didn't happen.

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Germany tried to push a BWR to superheated glory for extra efficiency, but like its American cousins Pathfinder and BONUS, the fancy upgrade proved too hot to handle – and the whole club ran out of steam fast.

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Every decade or so, someone in nuclear engineering decides water is just a little too… ordinary.

Some reactors fail after years of operation.

Marviken failed before the first fuel assembly ever entered the core—an awkward milestone for something advertised as a power plant.

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If you’ve ever wondered what happens when you mix brilliant nuclear engineering with Cold War optimism and a dash of reckless enthusiasm, look no further than the Soviet Project 705 Alfa-class submarines.

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South of Rincón, Puerto Rico—tucked behind surf breaks and palm trees—sits a lonely concrete dome that once symbolized the atomic future of the Caribbean. Today, it’s a quiet relic. But in the early 1960s, that dome housed one of the most ambitious nuclear experiments ever attempted.