Manufacturing challenges take center stage at M2IND

Industry had the floor at Materials and Manufacturing Innovation Days (M2IND), where more than 350 leaders from industry, government and the research community gathered on Aug. 19-20 at the Department of Energy's (DOE) Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). Discussions focused on barriers slowing the deployment of advanced manufacturing technologies and on how national laboratory capabilities and partnerships could help move those technologies toward production.

Across panel discussions, exhibits and partnership announcements, participants returned to common needs: more resilient supply chains and expanded options for critical materials, including material alternatives and recovery technologies; faster, more credible qualification; and closer integration of manufacturing with digital engineering, artificial intelligence (AI), robotics and automation. New collaborations paired laboratory capabilities with industry expertise around projects intended to turn research into solutions manufacturers can use.

"We want to make sure we have input from industry to help guide our research and ensure that the work at Oak Ridge and the Manufacturing Demonstration Facility (MDF) is valuable to U.S. manufacturers and takes into account the supply chains needed to commercialize new technologies," said MDF Director Ryan Dehoff.

The event brought together representatives from four DOE offices - Advanced Materials and Manufacturing Technologies Office (AMMTO), Building Technologies Office, Hydropower and Hydrokinetic Office, and Office of Nuclear Energy. Also represented were the Department of War's Office of Industrial Base Resilience and organizations spanning nuclear energy, hydropower, oil and gas, critical materials, manufacturing, defense and technology development. The discussions identified a shared set of obstacles: limited domestic capacity for large castings and forgings; long lead times for specialized components; a shortage of workers with manufacturing, automation and digital skills; inconsistent data formats; and qualification and certification requirements that can slow adoption even after a technology has been demonstrated. A participant from the hydropower industry noted that lead times for major components extend a decade or more.

"M2IND has brought folks together across the spectrum who have different reasons for being here and bring a different point of view but ultimately are aligned around the idea that there's urgency to accelerate our domestic manufacturing capabilities," said Kiley Naas, vice president of the public sector at Rescale.

Additive manufacturing for nuclear energy applications

Among the items displayed during M2IND were two large structures from additive manufacturing projects related to nuclear energy: a glass-fiber-reinforced polymer mockup of an impact limiter for spent nuclear fuel transportation and a closed steel pressure vessel produced using multirobot wire-arc additive manufacturing.

Impact limiters are massive structures attached to both ends of a shipping cask to protect it in the event of an accident. Traditionally made from wood, they can span 12 feet and weigh many thousands of pounds. Working with the University of Maine, MDF researchers recently 3D printed the mockup using glass-fiber-reinforced polymer to explore new materials and manufacturing approaches for this application.

The pressure vessel project explored a different nuclear manufacturing challenge. Using MedUSA, a large-scale wire-arc additive manufacturing system that coordinates three robotic arms, MDF researchers produced a 3-by-5-foot closed steel pressure vessel with complex domed geometry. Future research will focus on understanding qualification of the component for nuclear service.

Reactor vessels are traditionally made using large-scale forging and welding, processes constrained by limited domestic capacity. The vessel produced in this study provided a test case for examining whether additive manufacturing could offer an alternate route for producing large components.

Establishing a manufacturing route, however, is only part of the path to deployment. Forum participants also discussed the importance of process monitoring, defect detection and digital engineering in documenting how a component is made, tracking quality throughout production and generating the data needed to support qualification and confidence in performance.

To examine that challenge across facilities, ORNL and Idaho National Laboratory announced a laboratory-directed research and development collaboration during M2IND. By aligning manufacturing parameters, running comparable builds and sharing results, the researchers will test whether sensing, data and qualification methods remain reliable across different manufacturing systems and locations.

Partnerships aimed at industrial deployment

Among the new agreements announced during M2IND were cooperative research and development agreements with DMG MORI Federal Services and Lincoln Electric. Both projects connect ORNL research capabilities with industrial experience and routes to market.

The agreement with DMG MORI combines ORNL's advanced manufacturing, modeling, sensing and AI capabilities with the company's machine tool technologies. The collaboration will advance machining, additive manufacturing and intelligent digital production systems with the goal of moving laboratory innovations toward factory use more quickly.

The agreement with Lincoln Electric focuses on large-scale wire-arc additive manufacturing. The collaboration aims to improve process reliability, accelerate qualification and strengthen domestic capability to manufacture critical components for energy infrastructure.

Technology licensing provided another route for moving laboratory research toward industrial use. During M2IND, Chattanooga-based Branch Technology licensed an ORNL-developed plant-based insulation foam. Designed for use in building envelope panels with lightweight 3D-printed structures, the foam can be poured into wall panels to insulate buildings, reducing heat loss and offering an affordable insulation option made from abundant, domestically available materials.

The forum also highlighted an ORNL hybrid manufacturing process licensed to A.J. Tuck Company. The process combines 3D printing and electroforming to produce complex hot isostatic pressing (HIP) cans - sealed containers used to form high-performance metal parts from powder under heat and pressure. The approach could streamline production of critical components for energy and defense applications while reducing reliance on constrained supply chains.

Two memoranda of understanding broadened the event's partnership focus. One brings ORNL and SLB together to explore research opportunities in energy storage, critical minerals, advanced industrial processes and additive manufacturing. The other brings ORNL together with Kairos Power and other partners for an initial 12-month phase to explore new manufacturing and construction methods and workforce development for advanced nuclear reactors through the Nuclear Center for Advanced Manufacturing and Precast (NuCAMP).

"What we are seeing here today, with all the industry that's here, is the deployment of knowledge that has been created here [at MDF] into the manufacturing base of the United States, and that is good for all of us," said Leo Christodoulou, chief technology officer for Autonomous Resource Corporation.

Building the next manufacturing community

Beyond individual projects, M2IND recognized 10 years of Innovation Crossroads, ORNL's lab-embedded entrepreneurship program, and welcomed the program's 10th cohort of science and technology founders. A student poster competition also gave early-career researchers an opportunity to discuss their work with industry and laboratory leaders.

MDF is supported by DOE's AMMTO and acts as a nationwide consortium of collaborators focused on innovating, inspiring and catalyzing the transformation of U.S. manufacturing.

UT-Battelle manages ORNL for DOE's Office of Science, the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States. The Office of Science is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit energy.gov/science. - Tina M. Johnson