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Exciting developments in the nuclear sector this week! Here's a quick rundown of the Top 10: 1. UK and US join forces to accelerate advanced nuclear tech 2. Netherlands to evaluate nuclear new build options 3. Ukraine, Chernobyl site considered for new SMRs 4. Norway MoU signed with X-energy for SMR deployment 5. Belarus considering new NPP 6. UK and Finland new..
Energy Central…
Several milestones have been reached at nuclear power plant construction sites around the world including on the Leningrad II-2, Novovoronezh II-2, Barakah, and Plant Vogtle projects.
At the Leningrad site, Rosatom—the Russian state atomic energy corporation—reported on August 7 that the main turbine equipment installation for Phase II Unit 2 was completed. The company said that the stator, separators, superheaters, deaerator, turbine condensers, high- and low-pressure heaters, and heat exchangers have all been installed. Work will now begin on insulation, low-current and electrical installation, and the laying of external and internal engineering networks.
Leningrad Phase I has four RBMK-1000 units, which were connected to the power grid between 1973 and 1981. Phase II will have four VVER-1200 units, two of which are currently under construction. Unit 1 was connected to the grid on March 9 and is currently in the final stages of commissioning. It was the second VVER-1200 unit to be grid connected. Novovoronezh 6 (also known as Novovoronezh Nuclear Power Plant [NPP] 2 Unit 1) was the first VVER-1200 to enter service.…
Uranium oxide, the basic fuel for nuclear power plants, has recently sold at prices not seen in the past 13 years. In fact, the price is less than the cost of production in many cases. That could be a problem, because little is being done to increase the fuel supply, even though the world is adding new and larger reactors.
Late last year, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s Nuclear Energy Agency and the International Atomic Energy Agency released a joint 550-page report titled Uranium 2016: Resources, Production and Demand. It was the 26th edition of the now-biennial report, commonly referred to as the Red Book,with data current as of January 1, 2015.
One potentially concerning revelation was that total identified uranium resources had only increased by 0.1% since the previous report had been issued. A reason cited for the minuscule uptick was that very little investment had been made in exploration due to depressed uranium market conditions.
Indeed, the price for uranium oxide (U3O8) has been in a death spiral (Figure 1).…