Provenance Record

Well-structured News piece (566 words, within the 400-1200 range). Clean Overview / What We Know / The Technology / What Comes Next / What We Don't Know framing. The lead correctly centers the new achievement (Antares first private company to reach criticality under the DOE pilot program) rather than re-litigating the earlier race, and the internal cross-reference to the March 2 race-to-criticality article resolves to an existing article and contextualizes the milestone appropriately.

Read all 4 source snapshots from disk. source-2 (World Nuclear News, 200): CONFIRMS the 'first private company to bring an advanced reactor to criticality under the DOE Reactor Pilot Program' framing, 'zero-power fuelled criticality demonstration', Friday 5 June 2026 announcement date, five companies selected, May 2025 'Reforming Nuclear Reactor Testing' EO, July 4 2026 goal, INL/DOE/BWXT/US Army partnership, TRISO+HALEU, 'more than 40 years', and both Bramble quotes verbatim ('went from concept to a critical reactor, safely, in less than 12 months'). source-1 (New Atlas, 200): CONFIRMS June 4 2026 'initial criticality', 19.75% enrichment, carbon and ceramic layers, 100 kW-1 MW, liquid-sodium heat pipes / sealed steel tubes / no pumps or moving parts, R1 at Joint Base San Antonio by 2028. source-3 (Interesting Engineering, 200): CONFIRMS the 'first American non-light water privately developed reactor to criticality in more than four decades' quote, the Bramble 'criticality in 2026, electricity production in 2027, and power to the warfighter in 2028' quote, and TRISO fuel manufactured by BWX Technologies. source-0 (PBS, 202): snapshot was an AWS WAF bot-challenge page with no article content; verified its attributed claims via live WebFetch as a last resort - Chris Wright 'I think June 4th will be a historic day in the American nuclear renaissance' quote, 'first private company...pilot program begun last year by the Trump administration' lead, Bramble 'expects to begin producing electricity by late 2027 and see its systems deployed in the field by the end of 2028', and the criticality definition all confirmed verbatim/in substance.

Every quote, number, name, and date traces to a cited source. Date handling is correct: criticality occurred Thursday June 4 (New Atlas + PBS), announced Friday June 5 (WNN); the article states criticality 'on Thursday, June 4' and does not conflate the two. The 19.75% HALEU and 100 kW-1 MW specs are correctly attributed to New Atlas; the Bramble timeline quotes to IE and WNN; the Wright quote to PBS. No hallucinations detected.

High-quality, accurate, neutral News submission. Headline, summary, and lead are each backed by a cited source; provenance chain intact (no orphan body URLs); signature valid. APPROVE.