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round up
PLANT OPERATION EDF HAS CONFIRMED plans to extend operation of unit 1 at the UK’s Heysham NPP and Hartlepool NPP for a further two years until 2026. Heysham 1, in Lancashire, and Hartlepool, in Teesside will both have operated for 40 years in 2023.
THE US NUCLEAR Regulatory Commission has approved an exemption request from Pacific Gas & Electric Company (PG&E) to allow continued operation of the Diablo Canyon NPP beyond its current licences. This will allow PG&E to continue operating both units at Diablo Canyon while the company’s licence application is under review.
UPGRADES THE INTERNATIONAL ATOMIC Energy Agency’s planned new laboratory greenhouses have recently received pledges of €5.5m from 12 countries. The greenhouses are part of the Agency’s ReNuAL2 project to upgrade its nuclear applications laboratories in Seibersdorf,
CANADA’S BRUCE POWER NPP has shut down unit 3 in order to begin its Major Component Replacement (MCR) outage. The refurbished unit is scheduled to come back online in 2026.
SMRS
THE UK’S NUCLEAR Energy Agency (NEA) has recently published a 73-page study, which tracks the progress of selected small modular reactor (SMR) designs towards deployment. NEA says the SMR designs are at various stages of development, from fundamental research on new concepts to commercial deployment and operation of mature designs.’
V in 2016. Its integrated PWR design was completed in 2014 and it was identified as a key project in China’s 12th Five-Year Plan. The design, which has 57 fuel assemblies and integral steam generators, was developed from the larger ACP1000 PWR. China’s state council approved the ACP100
Science & Technology Demonstration Project in 2021 and first concrete was poured in July that year. The lower section of the containment shell of was hoisted into place on in February 2022 and the last tank of concrete for the nuclear island’s underground retaining walls was poured the following August. The project is owned by CNNC Hainan Nuclear
Power Company, a subsidiary of China National Nuclear Power (CNNP – itself a subsidiary of CNNC). The projected start-up date is May 2025.
Egypt First shipment to El-Dabaa A ship carrying the fi rst load of equipment for unit 1 of Egypt’s El-Dabaa NPP has left the port of St Petersburg. The consignment includes three main components of the melt localisation device (MLR or melt trap) manufactured by JSC Tyazhmash – a body, a fi ller and a melt catcher service platform. The 744-tonne body measures more than six metres in height and diameter. The El-Dabaa NPP will comprise four units
with generation III+ VVER-1200 pressurised water reactors. The $30bn project is mainly financed through a $25bn Russian loan. Russia will supply nuclear fuel throughout the lifecycle of the plant, arrange for the training of the Egyptian personnel, and assist in the operation and maintenance of the plant for the first 10 years. Egypt expects that the NPP will reach full capacity by 2030. The reference plant for El- Dabaa is the Leningrad-II NPP. The MLR is one of the main elements of the
passive safety system and is a feature of all VVER-1200 reactors. It is a a steel cone, which, in the event of an emergency, reliably holds fragments of the core melt within the hermetic shell of the reactor building. Work on the remaining melt trap equipment for El Dabaa 1 is continuing. JSC Tyazhmash will
supply MLR equipment for all four units as well as polar cranes and reactor shaft equipment. Egypt’s Nuclear Power Plants Authority (NPPA)
has commissioned a specialised sea wharf to receive units and equipment for El Dabaa.
United Kingdom Sellafield’s new silo facility A new facility designed to support the retrieval of waste from two of Sellafi eld’s most hazardous legacy facilities has begun operation. The Silo Maintenance Facility will maintain the equipment used to retrieve radioactive waste from the Magnox Swarf Storage Silo (MSSS) and the Pile Fuel Cladding Silo (PFCS that were not designed with decommissioning in mind. It will also maintain the fl asks that will transport the waste from silos to modern storage facilities that are being constructed on the site. The Silo Maintenance Facility was built on the footprint where two of the iconic Calder Hall cooling towers used to stand. Over the past eight years Sellafield supply
chain partners Balfour Beatty and Cavendish have constructed the new facility, with building work and equipment installation completed in April 2019. The final step was completed recently when the building received its first transport flask from MSSS, signalling the start of active operations. The first waste was retrieved from the silo in
2022 and earlier in March the second of three retrieval machines was installed in the silo. MSSS has stored nuclear waste for the last 60
years and was originally constructed as six silos in the 1960s and then extended three times. The silo emptying machines are far bigger than any of the entry points into the silo and have to be lifted in as 22 different modules and then assembled inside the building. Each weighs 360 tonnes. The design,
manufacture and assembly of the first machine began more than 20 years ago. It will take another three years of preparation and commissioning work inside the silo before the machine can start retrieving waste. According to Sellafield, retrieval work will take 25-30 years. U
A leader in nuclear instrumentation, Reuter-Stokes offers more than 60 years’ experience in the field, with thousands of neutron and gamma detectors deployed. This depth of experience has established Reuter-Stokes as an excellent operational partner, continually enhancing instruments to maintain excellent reliability, sensitivity and reduced service cycles.
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10 | April 2023 |
www.neimagazine.com
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