GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy said Tuesday it has won a three-year contract to support disassembly of two reactors at Sweden’s Oskarshamn Nuclear Power Plant.
The work, expected to start in January and wrap up by the end of 2019, involves segmentation of the reactor pressure vessel internals for reactor Units 1 and 2 at the plant operated by OKG AB near the city of Oskarshamn. After dismantlement and segmentation, the reactors’ internal components will be packaged for final disposal, according to GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy spokesman Jon Mark.
Mark declined to disclose the terms of the contract.
“There are a growing number of plants that will soon reach the end of their licensed operation and will require decommissioning,” he said by email Tuesday. “We look forward to supporting customers during the post-operational phase of the nuclear power plant life cycle.”
Both units at Oskarshamn are boiling water reactors. Unit 1 began operating in 1972 and is set to shut down in 2017; Unit 2 went online in 1974 and ceased operations in 2015. GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy will now prepared for segmentation work on Unit 2, which is expected to start in January 2018. Segmentation work for Unit 1 is scheduled to begin in 2019, and the project is expected to be completed in 2020.
“This is a breakthrough project for us in the decommissioning space in Europe and we look forward to drawing upon the many resources of the ‘GE Store,’ including the depth of the global supply chains of GE and the former Alstom power businesses to deliver superior safety and cost efficient performance for our customer,” GEH Nuclear Services Executive Vice President Lance Hall said in a statement Tuesday.
GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy, which is based in Wilmington, N.C., operates training operations in Wilmington and San Jose, Calif., as well as fuel manufacturing facilities in Wilmington and Kurihama, Japan.
According to Nuclear Energy Insider, nuclear decontamination and decommissioning projects in Europe are expected to increase 8 percent per year through 2026, due to decreased power prices and a boost in plants reaching the end of their life cycles. Germany will be of particular interest, as the country has initiated a nuclear phase-out, following the 2011 disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan. The country in 2011 immediately shut down eight of its 17 nuclear reactors and has scheduled closures for the rest by 2022. The U.K., Sweden, and France have also seen notable shutdown announcements in recent years.
Nuclear Energy Insider’s 2016 market survey projects 80.4 billion euros ($85 billion) being spent on global nuclear decommissioning in the next 25 years, as 200 reactors are expected to shut down by 2040.
