A Janesville nuclear fusion technology company has been awarded a $1.1 million U.S. Department of Energy grant to advance the company's plans of using recycled nuclear waste as a fuel source.
As it looks to commercialize fusion energy, Shine Technologies LLC said Thursday in a press release that it has appointed Todd Caccamo as chief revenue officer.
Caccamo has over 20 years of experience in the defense, medical and energy industries, including leadership roles at Materion Corp. and GE Aviation, where he scaled sales organizations and drove market expansion.
In his role at Shine, he will focus on guiding and systematizing existing processes in the company's various lines of business, which include producing radioactive drugs, using radiation to test microelectronic components and more.
"Todd comes to Shine at a critical moment as we ramp multiple product lines across a wide range of customers," said Greg Piefer, the company's CEO and founder. "His expertise with scaling sales organizations, particularly deploying people, processes and systems, is a perfect fit as we complete our transition from a development-stage company to a growth-stage enterprise."
Shine is a developing operation that currently produces the medical isotope lutetium-177 used in advanced medical treatments. The company is building a medical isotope production facility in Janesville expected to allow it to produce molybdenum‑99, the most commonly used medical isotope. The company has received financial support from the federal government to help it establish a reliable, U.S.-produced supply of the isotope without the use of highly enriched uranium.
The production of medical isotopes is just one phase of the company's four-phase operational development plan. The previously completed phase involved using neutrons generated from fusion to detect flaws and defects in the hardware of aerospace, defense and other critical industry equipment.
Phase 2 is the production of medical radioisotopes. In Phase 3, the company is planning to employ its proprietary fusion technology to recycle and reuse spent nuclear fuel.
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The new grant from the Department of Energy's Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer programs that are designed to advance commercialization of DOE-supported science and technology breakthroughs.
The United States has an estimated 86,000 metric tons of nuclear waste, a number that grows by about 2,000 tons per year, the company said. That waste still contains more than 90% of its energy capacity.
Ultimately, the company plans to advance to the fourth phase of its development, generating power from nuclear fusion reactions.
The Department of Energy grant is part of $142 million awarded to 123 small businesses in the United States earlier this month under a range of DOE offices, including Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response; Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation; Electricity; Nuclear Energy; and Office of Science. Shine Technologies is the only Wisconsin company to receive a grant in this funding round.
