In its mission to deploy Sweden’s first SMR—and start the nation’s first new reactor construction in more than 40 years—Blykalla has raised the second half of its Series A round.
The 80M SEK ($7.7M) in new funding doubles the total size of the Series A to 160m SEK ($15.5M). The investors in the round extension are:
- 92 Ventures, a new Danish fund led by Joachim Ante, cofounder of gaming platform Unity Technologies. Fund cofounder Chirayu Batra is also joining Blykalla’s board of directors.
- Armada Investment, a Swiss fund that has also participated in funding Oklo and Last Energy.
Norrsken Launcher and Nucleation Capital led the first half of the raise back in April, which also included participation from Earth Venture Capital, Farvatn, and private investors. Blykalla has secured ~$27M to date between fundraising and government grants.
Blykalla CEO Jacob Stedman told Ignition that the company is building with the future of Sweden and Earth in mind.
- The company plans to target heavy industry as customers for its lead-cooled fast fission reactor—decarbonizing while ensuring a reliable energy source for power-hungry operations.
- Stedman says Sweden is particularly well-suited for SMR deployment, as its transmission infrastructure between the south and north isn’t terribly robust, and the ability to power localized applications is essential.
Time to build: The Stockholm-based SMR developer was founded in 2013 with a concept for a lead-cooled fast fission reactor that it says can be up to 140x more efficient than traditional light water reactors. The company got to that number by calculating increases in fuel efficiency and output, as the SEALER design is meant to use nearly 100% of fuel rather than the ~5% LWRs get.
The Swedish permitting process for nuclear energy tech is changing this year, and Stedman said Blykalla is waiting on those developments before seeking a nuclear permit. Sweden plans to launch a pre-permitting program to open lines of communication between nuclear companies and the government, helping to streamline the process.
- Blykalla aims to submit its first nuclear permit application next summer, pending that development.
- After that, Stedman expects at least two years before the permit is approved.
What’s next? In the meantime, there’s plenty to do. Blykalla is beginning work on its non-nuclear test reactor located at a site in southern Sweden. It’s seeking a building permit and clearance to perform lead operations, but it won’t need a nuclear permit just yet.
The company is also hiring to scale up before building the test reactor. Blykalla has ~40 people on staff and plans to bring 20+ more on board this year (both employees and contractors) to work on engineering and construction.
+ While we’re here…The Swedish government also announced this week that it plans to invest more than 1B SEK ($97M) for carbon-free energy projects next year, including $9M in nuclear demo projects. It’s also planning to allocate 30M SEK ($2.9M) to strengthen the conditions for new nuclear in 2025.
Lead Reporter of Ignition
