atw Vol. 63 (2018) | Issue 4 ı April
Rosenergoatom had planned to
build two BN-1200 units at Beloyarsk
with commercial operation scheduled
by 2025. But construction depended
on the results of operating the pilot
Beloyarsk-4 BN-800 plant, which
began commercial operation in
October 2016.
There is another commercially
operational sodium-cooled FBR at
Beloyarsk, the BN-600. Both the
BN-600 and the BN-800 are smaller
versions of the BN-1200. There are
also two permanently shut-down
light-water reactors at the site.
| | www.rosatom.ru
265
NEWS
| | Kursk II passed construction milestone.
21st century. Just a few Russian
regions have such opportunities,” he
stressed.
Vyacheslav Fedyukin, Director
of Kursk NPP, noted it was symbolic
that the event happened on the
25 th anniversary of RosEnergoAtom
and 10 years after the foundation of
Rosatom, the companies that shaped
the newest history of Russia’s nuclear
industry. “Construction of Russia’s
first VVER-TOI-based power unit
proves that the national nuclear
power industry is always at the
cutting edge of science and engineering.
The new generation VVER-TOI
units are state-of-the-art facilities
made to the best of Russia’s nuclear
engineering knowledge,” he added.
At the moment, other operations
are also underway at the construction
site of Kursk II. Among them is excavation
of 1.2 million cub m of soil
to be completed in 2017, with over
800,000 cub m of sand, gravel
and aggregate already put in the
foun dation of Kursk II buildings
and structures. Construction of a
330/10 kV substation and preparation
of technical documents for its commissioning
are also drawing to a
close.
For reference:
Kursk II is designed to replace the
existing Kursk Nuclear Power Plant
that will be taken out of operation in
the years to come. Its first two units
with VVER-TOI, a new-type reactor,
will be commissioned simultaneously
with decommissioning of Units 1 and
2 of the existing nuclear station.
According to the master schedule of
Kursk II, Unit 1 will be commissioned
in late 2023 to be followed by Unit 2 in
late 2024.
| | (18791501),
ww.rosatom.ru
Russia Confirms Plans to
Revive BN-1200 Fast Breeder
Reactor Project
(nucnet) Russia plans to begin construction
of its first industrial-sized
sodium-cooled fast neutron reactor in
the 2020s after saying three years ago
that the project had been postponed,
the head of state nuclear corporation
Rosatom Alexei Likhachev told president
Vladimir Putin.
According to a transcript of a
meeting posted on the Kremlin’s
website, Mr Likhachev told Mr Putin
that fast breeder reactors (FBRs) have
significant advantages over existing
reactor types and Rosatom is proposing
that Russia goes ahead
with its plans for the Generation IV
BN-1200.
FBRs have been and are being
explored or constructed in Russia,
France, India, China, Japan and the
US. They allow a significant increase
in the amount of energy obtained
from natural, depleted and recycled
uranium. The technology also enables
plutonium and other actinides to be
used and recycled.
Russia operates the BN-600 and
BN-800 FBR units at Beloyarsk and
the BOR-60 fast breeder research
reactor at the Research Institute
of Atomic Reactors (RIAR) site in
Dimitrovgrad, southwest Russia.
BOR-60 is used to test fuel cycle,
sodium coolant technologies and a
range of design concepts for fast
breeder reactors.
In 2015, Rosatom said construction
of the planned BN-1200 at the
Beloyarsk nuclear power station in
central Russia had been postponed
until at least 2020, with state
nuclear operator Rosenergoatom
citing the need to improve fuel
for the reactor and questioning the
project’s economic feasibility.
Austria Begins Legal Action
Against EC Over Hungary’s
Paks Nuclear Project
(nucnet) Austria has filed a legal
complaint against the European Commission
with the European Court of
Justice in Luxembourg for allowing
Hungary to expand its Paks nuclear
power station.
Austrian minister of sustainability
and tourism Elisabeth Köstinger said
in a statement that nuclear power
“must have no place in Europe” and
Austria will not “not budge one
centimetre” from its anti-nuclear
stance.
The EC started an investigation
into state aid given to the Paks 2
project in November 2014. Last March
it approved the project to build two
new reactors, to be financed with the
help of Russia’s state atomic energy
corporation Rosatom, after regulators
said Hungarian authorities had
agreed to several measures to ensure
fair competition.
In January 2018, Austria announced
it planned to sue the EC over
the decision. “EU assistance is only
permissible when it is built on common
interest. For us, nuclear energy is
neither a sustainable form of energy
supply, nor is it an answer to climate
change”, a statement by the ministry
of sustainability said at the time.
The two planned units at Paks 2
nuclear power station are expected
to begin commercial operation in
2026 and 2027, Attila Aszódi,
the Hungarian government’s commissioner
for the Paks 2 project,
told a conference in Brussels late l
ast year.
An agreement signed in 2014
will see Russia supply two VVER-
1200 pressurised water reactors for
Paks 2 and a loan of up to €10bn
($12.3bn) to finance 80% of the
€12bn project.
| | www.bundeskanzleramt.gv.at
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