NEWS |
round up
CLEAN-UP A NEW TECHNIQUE to remove sludge from nuclear fuel ponds has been successfully trialled at the Deep Recovery Facility operated by UK engineering firm Forth. The facility has been used to test safe retrieval of debris from the bottom of fuel ponds at sites operated by the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA).
THE OAK RIDGE Office of Environmental Management and contractor United Cleanup Oak Ridge are now focusing on soil and groundwater remediation at the East Tennessee Technology Park, according to the US Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management,
POLICY ITALY’S LOWER HOUSE of Parliament has passed two motions aimed at reversing Italy’s earlier decision to abandon nuclear energy. The text commits the government to “consider including nuclear power as an alternative and clean source of energy production in the national energy mix” so as to “accelerate Italy’s decarbonisation process.”
THE US DEPARTMENT of Energy (DOE) has awarded $22.1m to 10 industry-led projects, including two aimed at expanding clean hydrogen production with nuclear energy and one focused on bringing a microreactor design closer to deployment. The other projects focus on nuclear regulatory hurdles, improving operations of existing reactors, and facilitating new advanced reactor developments.
FUSION
US FUSION ENERGY tech startup Helion Energy has signed an agreement to provide Microsoft with electricity from its first fusion power plant. Constellation will serve as the power marketer and will manage transmission for the project. Helion said the plant is expected to be online by 2028 and will target power generation of 50 MW or more after a one-year ramp up period.
RESEARCHERS AT RUSSIA’S NRNU MEPhI (National Research University - Moscow Power Engineering Institute) are investigating the accumulation of helium and deuterium in promising “smart” W-Cr-Y alloys for use in thermonuclear reactors. The results of the study were published in the Journal of Nuclear Materials.
Netherlands
First foundation concrete for Pallas Work has started on the foundations for the Pallas research reactor at Petten, in the municipality of Schagen in the Netherlands. In February, the Nuclear & Radiation
Protection Authority (ANVS - Autoriteit Nucleaire Veiligheid en Stralingsbescherming) granted a construction licence for the reactor and Rijkswaterstaat issued the Water Act permit for the intake and discharge of cooling water. The Pallas reactor is intended to replace
the existing 45 MWt High Flux Reactor (HFR), operated by NRG on behalf of the European Union’s Joint Research Centre, which began operation in September 1960. The new 55 MWt tank-in-pool type Pallas reactor will be able to deploy the neutron flux more efficiently and effectively than the HFR. The decision on funding for the overall Pallas programme is being debated by the government and is expected to be made this year. The Minister of Health, Welfare & Sport instructed Pallas to continue with project preparations to avoid unnecessary delays. Using special excavation techniques,
diaphragm walls were put in place into which the concrete will be poured. “Now that all the necessary permits are in place, we can proceed with the realisation of the construction pit in which the Pallas reactor will be built,” said Pallas Programme Director Peter Dijk. The work on the construction pit is expected to be completed by the end of 2024 ready for the construction of the reactor. For the construction pit, a hole will be dug about 50 metres square and 21 metres deep. First, one-and-a-half-metre-wide trenches are dug into which concrete is poured to form the diaphragm walls. Preparations for the construction pit will
continue pending a final financing decision from the Dutch government and state aid approval from the European Commission.
Russia Fefuel of Akademik Lomonosov FNPP Scheduled repairs will begin at Russia’s floating NPP (FNPP), Akademik Lomonosov, moored in Pevek in Chukotka, Russia’s northernmost city. This will include replacement of fuel in two reactors, with the work scheduled to be completed in early 2024. Fuel was loaded into the reactors for the first time in October 2018 at the Atomflot site in Murmansk, a few months before the FNPP was sent to Chukotka. It now provides both electricity and heat to Pevek and the surrounding region. The Akademik Lomonosov FNPP, developed
and constructed by Rosatom, was connected to the grid in December 2019, and at the end of May 2020 began commercial operation. The keel was laid in 2007 at Sevmash in Severodvinsk, but in August 2008 Rosatom transferred the contract to the Baltic Shipyard in St Petersburg, where the 21,500 tonne hull was launched at the end of June 2010. The FNPP is equipped with
12 | June 2023 |
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two KLT-40S reactors with an electric power of 35 MW each. The power capacity of the FNPP is 70 MW, the heat capacity is 50 Gcal/h. The Akademik Lomonosov is the lead project of a series of mobile transportable low power units to be sited in the Far North and the Far East to provide energy to remote industrial enterprises, port cities and gas and oil platforms. Rosatom has since announced plans to update its FNPP project using the larger RITM-200. Nuclear fuel for the reload the will be
delivered by sea or plane. Then it will be loaded into the reactors. “The process is absolutely safe,” Rosenergoatom said. “Shutdown of the station is not required, since the output takes place on a staggered basis from the two reactors. The fuel loading will take place on each reactor, while maintaining output. Used fuel will be placed in special storage facilities on board the power unit, where it will completely isolated and safe.” Scheduling and preparatory repairs at the
station start in June. One of the main stages of the work will be the refuelling. The reactors use enriched uranium, which must be changed every 3-4 years. It is planned that repairs will be completed in early 2024.
South Korea Doosan starts NuScale forgings South Korea’s Doosan Enerbility has begun forging the first module that will be deployed as part of a NuScale VOYGR-6 small modular reactor (SMR) power plant for the Carbon Free Power Project (CFPP) in the USA. “The first pours of molten steel represent a significant breakthrough into the manufacturing phase for NuScale, Doosan and the SMR industry, “ NuScale said on its Facebook page. . NuScale placed its first order with Doosan
Enerbility at the end of 2022 for the upper reactor pressure vessel (RPV) long-lead material production. In 2019, Doosan Enerbility (then Doosan Heavy Industries & Construction) signed a collaboration agreement with NuScale for the supply of NuScale Power Modules and other equipment. Doosan, together with Korean financial investors, has made an equity investment of nearly $104m in NuScale Power. In preparation for the long-lead materials
order, the two companies initiated an effort in April 2022 to complete the manufacturing for the forging dies for the upper RPV. The subsequent order, placed in December, includes heavy forgings, steam generator tubes, and weld material for six upper RPVs. NuScale said the total estimated weight of the materials for six upper RPVs is more than 2000 tonnes,. The CFPP is to be built at the US Department
of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory site near Idaho Falls and plans to use six NuScale 77 MWe power modules to generate 462 MWe. NuScale said the plant could begin operations in 2029, and Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems hopes to submit an application for a construction and operation licence to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission in January 2024.
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