Power On For World's First Floating Nuclear Plant

Written by Martin Lynch, European News Editor for Industrial Info (Galway, Ireland)--The world's first floating nuclear power plant (FNPP) has been fully commissioned in remote northeast Russia.

The Akademik Lomonosov is a 144-metre-long ship, weighing in at 21,500 tons and featuring a pair of 35-megawatt (MW) KLT-40S reactors. Generating a total of 70 MW of electricity and 300 MW of heat, it can supply enough energy for roughly 100,000 homes. It will also be used to power the region's Chaun-Bilibin mining complex, which includes gold mines. Industrial Info reported in September last year that the Lomonosov had set sail across the Arctic ocean on a 5,000-kilometre (km) journey from the Arctic port of Murmansk to Chukotka in the far east. It will be used as a replacement for the outgoing 48-MW Bilibino nuclear plant--the world's smallest and most remote nuclear plant--and the Chaunskaya combined heat and power plants, which generate all of the electricity in the isolated region. For additional information, see September 2, 2019, article - Russia's Floating Nuclear Power Plant Sets Sail.

"Today we can consider the floating nuclear power plant construction project successfully completed," said Andrei Petrov, director of Rosenergoatom (Electric Energy Division of Rosatom), the subsidiary responsible for the FNPP project implementation. "We finished our main task for this year - fully commissioned the FNPP in Pevek, Chukotka region. Today, it officially becomes the 11th nuclear power plant in Russia and the northernmost one in the world."

The FNPP started providing electricity to the isolated grid of the Chaun-Bilibino energy center of Chukotka in December. It already has generated more than 47.3 million kilowatt-hours of electricity since being connected to the grid--supplying 20% of the region's power demand. It will become the main energy source for Chukotka following the Bilibino nuclear plant shutdown.

The project has been dogged by delays for more than a decade, ranging from bankruptcy proceedings and contract delays to a change in shipbuilders. According to Industrial Info the project was originally due for delivery in 2011 and commissioning in 2012 and, after more delays, was due for commissioning again at the end of 2016. Early in 2018, the project was finally green-lit for operation by the Russian State Expert Examination Board (Glavgosexpertiza). For additional information, see August 21, 2018, article - Green Light for First Floating Nuclear Power Plant.

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