First contract signed for Cernavoda completion [View all]

[NNadir]

First contract signed for Cernavoda completion

A year-long, CAD8.4 million (USD6.6 million) contract will see Canada's Candu Energy prepare the licensing basis for two new Candu pressurised heavy water reactors at Romania's Cernavoda nuclear power plant. The signing was celebrated by the governments of Romania and Canada, as well as the USA.

"The potential to develop two new-build nuclear reactors demonstrates that the Romanian government, along with several other of our public sector clients around the world, recognise that safe, reliable, affordable, low-carbon nuclear energy is how we will combat and ultimately, win the battle against climate change,’’ said Ian Edwards, president and CEO of SNC-Lavalin, which owns Candu Energy. The deal was signed with EnergoNuclear, the project company set up to complete Cernavoda.

The contract was described as the first in a 24-month 'prepatory stage' towards completing the partially-built Candu-6 units Cernavoda 3 and 4, on which work stopped in 1991...

...Although this contract is focused on Canadian contribution, the USA is a major partner for Romania in this project. US Charge d’Affaires in Romania David Muniz said, “The United States is working to provide Romanians with clean, safe, reliable, and affordable energy while ensuring trusted partners contribute to Romania’s vital national and energy security needs."

Kathryn Huff, the US Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy, called the signing "a major milestone" adding that it supports the goals of the intergovernmental agreement between the USA and Romania and "continues the strong relationship between our countries in the field of nuclear energy."

In addition, Nuclearelectrica's announcement included a statement from Thomas White, the CEO of US engineering firm Sargent & Lundy, which has previously worked on Candu projects in Canada and Romania. He said, "We’re thrilled to continue our business relationship with Candu Energy and Romania," but details of the company's involvement were not immediately available...

...Nuclearelectrica CEO Cosmin Ghita noted that completion of Cernavoda 3 and 4 will bring up to 19,000 indirectly generated jobs while raising nuclear to 36% of electricity supply and 66% of Romania's clean energy total. When all four units are in operation, Cernavoda will avoid a total of 20 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions per year, he said.

Dr. Huff is one of the Biden administration's finest appointments to the DOE and undoes some of the damage done to the environment by the unfortunate appointment of Gregory Jaczko to the NRC in a previous administration.

Dr. Jaczko regrettably was a fool who worked actively to see that climate change and the vast number of deaths from air pollution were ignored, possibly because he perceived that nuclear energy was "too dangerous." It follows that he thought that climate change and air pollution weren't "too dangerous." About 7 million people die each year from air pollution, more than six orders of magnitude more than die from radiation. Jaczko couldn't care less.

The CANDU (aka HWR) is my favorite thermal spectrum reactor, since it can run on the DUPIC cycle using "once through" uranium, which makes up the bulk of used nuclear fuel. In the process, it consumes additional reactor grade plutonium. Plutonium/thorium/uranium fuels in HWR can achieve very high burn ups, making up for the loss of precious plutonium and consuming depleted uranium but more commonly they achieve low burn ups using natural (unenriched) uranium.

Heavy Water Reactors operate in Canada, Romania, India, and Korea. I wish we had some in the United States, but they have never been licensed here.