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Run your analysis now →https://www.patsnap.com/resources/blog/rd-blog/small-modular-reactors-small-reactor-fuel-patent-landscape-patent-landscape/ · Patsnap · data cut-off 2026-07-31 · downloaded from the live page
Patent Landscape · Nuclear Fission & Fusion EnergySmall reactor fuel patents: who is filing, what they claim, and where the field is still open
2,828
Published Records
30%
Top-5 Share of All Records
+5%
Filing Growth 2021→2024
JP
Leading Jurisdiction
Filing growth compares 2021 (39 records) with 2024 (41) — a three-year span. 2024 is the most recent year we treat as complete: publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so 2025 onwards are still filling in and any growth rate that ends there would understate the field. Top-5 share is the combined record count of the five largest assignees divided by all 2,828 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
Published byPatsnap Research··6 min readSourced from Patsnap Eureka
Overview
What this landscape covers
This landscape covers 2,828 published records filed against small reactor fuel search terms combined with the G21C nuclear reactor classification, spanning 2015 through the 2026 data cut-off. The scope captures fuel assembly design, fuel material composition, and the hardware that supports fuel handling inside compact reactor cores, with most records also carrying secondary classifications in power plant systems, radiation shielding, alloys and material testing.
Because a single filing can span jurisdictions and continuations, the family-level view in the assignee ranking is the more reliable way to read who actually leads. Raw document counts by receiving office instead show where applicants are choosing to seek protection, which is a separate question from who invented what first.
Filing activity and technology composition, 2015–2026
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee ranking and totals. Derived from a Patsnap search on Small Modular Reactors: Small Reactor Fuel Patent Landscape covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
The data
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 2,828 records: how filing activity has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses the fuel-related claims actually sit in.
A steady climb, understated at the edges
Filings ran from 36 in 2017 to a peak of 46 in 2018, then held in a comparable band through 2021 (39) and 2024 (41) — a 5% increase over that three-year span. Counts fall off after 2024 and drop to 7 by 2026, but that reflects the roughly 18-month lag between filing and publication, not a genuine pullback in R&D activity.
Concentrated in reactor and plant classes, with a material-science tail
Almost every record (99.7% of the 2,828 in scope) sits in G21C nuclear reactors, as the search scope requires. The next-largest classes are G21D nuclear power plants at 6.3% and G21F radiation protection at 2.3%, with smaller but consistent representation in alloys (C22C, 1.9%), metal compounds (C01G, 1.1%) and material testing and non-ferrous treatment (each under 1%) — evidence that fuel cladding and structural material work is a real but minority strand within the broader fuel filing activity.
Shares are the percentage of the 2,828 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Filing trend and technology composition. Derived from a Patsnap search on Small Modular Reactors: Small Reactor Fuel Patent Landscape covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.
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What the most-cited and most representative filings show
Representative recent filing
Small modular reactor including small fuel assemblies
KOREA HYDRO & NUCLEAR POWER CO., LTD
The filing describes a small modular reactor whose fuel material is arranged in a first, closely-packed arrangement region surrounded by multiple second arrangement regions holding differently sized fuel assemblies — a sectioned core layout aimed at compact reactor geometries rather than a conventional uniform core.Filed by Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power Co., Ltd, published 2025-01-23.
Most-cited records in scope
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US5030412A | Fuel assembly debris screen | 126 |
| 2 | US4684495A | Fuel assembly bottom nozzle with integral debris trap | 117 |
| 3 | US4684496A | Debris trap for a pressurized water nuclear reactor | 97 |
| 4 | US4900507A | Nuclear fuel assembly debris filter bottom nozzle | 93 |
| 5 | US4832905A | Lower end fitting debris collector | 93 |
| 6 | US4280872A | Core catcher device | 74 |
| 7 | US4675154A | Nuclear fuel assembly with large coolant conducting tube | 73 |
| 8 | US4968479A | Fuel assembly for nuclear reactor | 65 |
| 9 | US3957575A | Mechanical design of a light water breeder reactor | 64 |
| 10 | US4449403A | Guide tube inserted liquid level sensor | 61 |
Citation counts favour older filings simply because they have had more time to be cited; treat them as a signal of influence within this corpus, not of current technical importance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Citation counts and representative records. Derived from a Patsnap search on Small Modular Reactors: Small Reactor Fuel Patent Landscape covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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Reading the concentration and the trend together
Three findings that shape where a new filer or a licensing team should focus attention.
Concentration
29.7% / 44.2%
share of 2,828 records held by top 5 / top 10 assignees
A leader plus a long tail, not a closed field
The leading assignee alone accounts for 207 records, and the top five combined hold 29.7% of all 2,828 records in scope. That still leaves more than 70% of filings distributed across a long tail of entities, including many single-filing entrants — a structure that rewards a well-targeted claim more than it punishes a late one.
Ranked leaders, 100 companies tracked
Filing momentum
39 → 41 (+5%)
filings 2021 to 2024
Growth is real but modest, and recent years understate it
Filing volume grew 5% from 2021 to 2024, the last year that can be read as complete. The visible decline after 2024 is a publication-lag effect — records filed in 2025 and 2026 are still working through the roughly 18-month gap before they appear in this dataset.
Peak year to date: 2018 at 46 filings
Technology mix
6.3% G21D
share of records also classed in nuclear power plants
Fuel claims rarely sit in isolation
Beyond the core G21C reactor classification, a meaningful minority of records also touch power plant systems (6.3%), radiation shielding (2.3%) and structural alloys (1.9%). That overlap signals that fuel assembly claims are frequently bundled with plant-level or material-level protection rather than filed as narrow, standalone fuel claims.
Classes overlap; shares are of the 2,828-record total, not additive
Jurisdiction
690 filings
Japan, the leading receiving office
Filing geography favours Japan and the UK over the US
Japan (690) and the United Kingdom (656) each outpace the United States (365) as receiving offices, with China (216), the EPO (200) and South Korea (189) forming a second tier. A filer weighing where to seek protection should note that the busiest offices are not the ones a US-centric search would surface first.
Receiving office counts, not family-adjusted
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Source: Patsnap Eureka. Co-assignee relationships and derived observations. Derived from a Patsnap search on Small Modular Reactors: Small Reactor Fuel Patent Landscape covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
What's next
Where to take this analysis
The figures above answer where the field stands today. The next questions are usually about specific claims and specific competitors.
Map the white space
Identify which fuel assembly sub-branches remain thinly claimed relative to the debris-handling and cladding clusters that already carry dense prior art.
Explore white space in EurekaTrack a specific assignee
Follow filing behaviour for any of the ranked leaders over time, including which IPC classes they concentrate in and where their claims overlap with co-assignees.
Search assignees in EurekaCheck freedom to operate
Run a specific fuel assembly or core-layout concept against the most-cited debris screen and fuel filter families before committing engineering time.
Run an FTO check in EurekaSource: Patsnap Eureka. Forward-looking reading of the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Small Modular Reactors: Small Reactor Fuel Patent Landscape covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
FAQ
Common questions about small reactor fuel patents
The leading assignee in this dataset holds 207 of the 2,828 records in scope, with the top five combined accounting for 29.7% and the top ten for 44.2%. That leaves more than half the field spread across a long tail of entities, many with only a handful of filings each. No single company controls the space outright, so a new entrant's freedom-to-operate analysis needs to look well beyond the largest few names.
Filings grew 5% between 2021 and 2024, the most recent year with a reasonably complete count. The apparent drop after 2024 is a publication-lag effect rather than a real slowdown — patent applications typically take around 18 months to publish, so 2025 and 2026 figures will keep rising as more filings surface. Treat any year within the last two as provisional.
Nearly all records (99.7% of the 2,828 in scope) sit in the G21C nuclear reactors classification by design of the search scope, but a meaningful minority also touch nuclear power plants (6.3%), radiation protection and shielding (2.3%), and structural alloys (1.9%). This overlap means fuel-related claims are often bundled with plant-level systems or material composition claims rather than filed as isolated, narrow fuel claims.
Japan leads as a receiving office with 690 filings, followed closely by the United Kingdom at 656. The United States trails both at 365, with China, the European Patent Office and South Korea forming a second tier between 189 and 216 filings each. Applicants building a filing strategy around US-first assumptions should note that the busiest offices for this technology sit elsewhere.
The most-cited records in this dataset are dominated by fuel assembly debris-handling hardware — debris screens, bottom nozzle debris traps, and lower end fitting debris collectors, several cited over 90 times and one over 120. High citation counts here reflect influence within an older, well-established design problem rather than current state of the art, since citation counts in any searched corpus favour records that have simply had more years to accumulate them.
Answers are grounded in the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Small Modular Reactors: Small Reactor Fuel Patent Landscape covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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Disclaimer. This page is generated from Patsnap Eureka data drawn from a limited snapshot of global patent and scientific-literature records, and is provided for general information and reference only.
Patent data carries inherent limitations: recent filings (typically the most recent 18–24 months) are under-counted due to standard publication lag; counts may be reported at either a patent-family or a patent-record basis and are not always directly comparable; classification, applicant-name, and citation data may contain errors, duplicates, or omissions; and the underlying search query defines and constrains the scope shown. As a result, the analysis may be incomplete or inaccurate and may not reflect the full technology landscape.
Nothing on this page constitutes an exhaustive prior-art, novelty, freedom-to-operate, or validity search, nor does it constitute legal, financial, investment, or professional advice, and it should not be relied upon as such. Any patent, commercial, or strategic decision should be verified independently and reviewed with qualified patent, legal, and domain professionals. Patsnap makes no warranties, express or implied, as to the accuracy, completeness, or fitness for any particular purpose of the information presented.
Machine translation. Assignee and organisation names originally recorded in Chinese, Japanese or Korean have been rendered into English by an AI translation step so that the tables stay readable. These renderings are best-effort and may not match a company's registered English name; the original name is what the underlying patent record carries, and it is what any Eureka query launched from this page uses.