World's First VVER-1200 Reactor Up and Running

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Written by Martin Lynch, European News Editor for Industrial Info (Galway, Ireland)--The first VVER-1200 nuclear reactor has entered commercial operation in Russia at the Novovoronezh nuclear power plant.

Russia's state-owned Rosatom Corporation (Moscow, Russia) said the new VVER-1200/392M is a third-generation pressurised water reactor (PWR) unit with a design net capacity of 1,114 megawatts (MW). It generated its first power last August and is the first of two units to become fully operational at the new Novovoronezh II nuclear power plant, which is under construction near the existing plant. Construction of units 1 and 2 at Novovoronezh II started in summer 2008 and 2009.

The new generation of reactor boosts capacity from 1,000 MW to 1,200 MW. It is cheaper to build and run, conforms to the post-Fukushima safety requirements and doubled its operational lifespan from 30 to 60 years.

"Low power testing was successfully passed at the stages of power start-up, pilot operation, during which the equipment and system checkout and testing at different capacity levels and under different operation conditions were carried out," stated Russia's civil nuclear power plant operator Rosenergoatom. "The testing was successfully finished on 23 February 2017 after 15 days of performance testing at 100% capacity, in the course of which a sustainable load-carrying ability of the power unit was confirmed in accordance with the project parameters."

Jacques Regaldo, Chairman at the World Association of Nuclear Operators (WANO), praised the start of the new reactor. "The personnel of Novovoronezh NPP may be proud of the start of the commercial operation at VVER-1200. I would like to wish your team a long and safe operation of the new unit", said Chairman Regaldo, summarizing the results of the visit.

Novovoronezh is located on the bank of the Don River, 42 kilometres to the south of Voronezh. It was the first Russian nuclear power plant to use VVER reactors. The first unit was commissioned in 1964, the second in 1969, the third in 1971, the fourth in 1972 and the fifth in 1980. Units 1 and 2 were decommissioned in 1984 and 1990, respectively, with the other three still in operation.

The VVER-1200 is planned for a number of Russian projects as well Turkey's first nuclear plant at Akkuyu in Mersin on the Mediterranean coast. The project, which broke ground in 2015, will use four VVER-1200 reactors, and the plant will have a total generating capacity of up to 4,800 MW. For additional information, see April 24, 2015, 2013, article--Turkey Builds First Nuclear Plant.

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