Navy Plants Reactor Inside Weapons Depot

The U.S. Navy will build a nuclear reactor inside one of its own weapons depots, and the government has not yet said who will build it or what it will cost.

Story Snapshot

The Department of War announced on September 9, 2026, that Naval Weapons Station Crane in Indiana will host the state’s first advanced nuclear microreactor.
The reactor must be up and running no later than September 2028.
The project carries out executive orders President Trump signed in May 2025 to speed up military nuclear power.
Officials have not named a builder or released a cost estimate for the Crane reactor.

Navy Picks Indiana Base for First Reactor

The Department of War said it will install a Micro Modular Reactor at Naval Weapons Station Crane in southwest Indiana. It will be the state’s first advanced nuclear reactor. The project must be finished no later than September 2028. Crane stores and tests weapons systems and needs steady, reliable power to keep running its mission around the clock.

The Army’s Janus Program, the Office of the Assistant Secretary of War, and the Navy are running the project together. That joint setup shows the Pentagon folding nuclear power planning across service branches instead of running separate efforts, a shift from earlier small pilot programs toward full-scale deployment.

Trump’s Executive Orders Set the Deadline

President Trump signed four executive orders on nuclear energy on May 23, 2025. They told the Secretary of War, working through the Secretary of the Army, to get a reactor running at a domestic base by September 30, 2028. The Crane project directly answers that order, building on a 2019 law that already told the Pentagon and the Energy Department to build at least one microreactor by the end of 2027.

This is not a one-base experiment. The Army’s Janus Program plans to hand out up to $2.2 billion to five companies to build and run microreactors at five bases, including Fort Campbell, Kentucky. The Air Force has separately picked Radiant, Antares, and Westinghouse to build reactors at three more bases by 2028, and Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska is already piloting one of its own.

Local Lawmakers Cheer the Announcement

Indiana Senator Todd Young and Representative Erin Houchin both praised the news, saying it will strengthen energy security and boost the nuclear industry in their state. Their support points to a rare area of bipartisan agreement: using nuclear power to protect military bases from outages while growing manufacturing jobs tied to reactor construction back home.

🇺🇸The Department of War said it will install Indiana’s 1st advanced nuclear Micro Modular Reactor at Naval Weapons Station Crane no later than September 2028.

The commercially owned unit is meant to give the Navy installation around-the-clock power off the commercial grid and… pic.twitter.com/oSHgyNQjE6

— NewsForce (@Newsforce) September 9, 2026

The Department of War’s announcement does not name which company will build the Crane reactor or say how much the project will cost. That silence on price echoes other recent Navy work at Crane, including a $45 million maintenance contract awarded earlier this year for base repairs. As the Pentagon rolls out nuclear projects across the country, taxpayers are still waiting for the spending details and contractor names that typically follow these early announcements.