Rosatom drafts 506-bln-ruble development plan for new nuclear technologies to 2030
MOSCOW. June 8 (Interfax) - Rosatom, Russia's state nuclear corporation has drafted a plan to develop new nuclear technologies that is supposed to be included in Russia's new social and economic development strategy to 2030.
The datasheet for the New Atomic Energy plan was presented for review to the State Council's energy working group. The cost of the plan, which is intended for the period from 2021 to 2030, is estimated at 506 billion rubles, national daily Kommersant said on Tuesday.
Rosatom hopes to receive 150.3 billion rubles of the total from the federal budget, including an additional 98 billion rubles that were not previously factored into it. The rest will be covered by unspecified extra-budgetary sources. The draft plan is expected to be presented to the government soon.
The most expensive part of the plan is Small Atom, which calls for developing and building a line of small-capacity nuclear power plants (NPP). It will cost an estimated 260 billion rubles, including 39.15 billion rubles from the budget.
The plan calls for launching four floating generating units with 55-MW RITM-200 reactors to supply power for the Baimsky GOK mining project by December 31, 2028. At the end of December 2030, the company plans to launch the first onshore NPP with a RITM-200N reactor, which probably refers to a plant in Yakutia for the Kyuchusskoye gold deposit, the paper said.
By the end of 2030 Rosatom also expects to fine-tune and launch pilot Shelf M units with capacity of up to 10 MW and Yelena AM units with thermal capacity of 5 Gcal/h and electricity generating capacity of 400 kW, which could become energy sources for remote parts of the country.
Rosatom hopes to secure the first export contract for a small-capacity NPP at the end of 2026, and have contracts for six units by the end of 2030. The company expects to become the leader on the global market for small NPP by 2030, with a share of at least 20%.
The second part of the plan is Zero Waste Atom, which involves developing closed nuclear fuel cycle technology and construction of fast-neutron reactors. Rosatom plans to launch a BREST-300 lead-cooled fast reactor at the end of December 2027, and have the project documentation for the BN-1200M sodium-cooled reactor ready by the end of 2030. The cost of these projects is estimated at 222.65 billion rubles, of which 121.37 billion rubles are expected to come from extra-budgetary sources.
The third part of the plan is Clean Atom for the World. This section talks about Russia's plans to export fuel for foreign-designed NPP with the aim of Rosatom increasing its share of the global nuclear fuel market to 24% by 2030 from the current 17%. Rosatom plans to secure its first contract (one complete refueling) in 2022 and build a portfolio of four contracts and expand supplies to 18 PWR units (TVS-Kvadrat square fuel assemblies) by the end of 2030.
Rosatom also intends to get, at the global level, "confirmation of feasibility of recognizing nuclear energy as an instrument to fight climate change." This refers to getting nuclear energy included in the taxonomy and other policy documents concerning the climate. This part of the plan will cost an estimated 23.39 billion rubles, of which about 10 billion rubles is expected to become from the government.