The “New Atomic Energy” programme is already being carried out, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak told the meeting. Novak, quoted by the government website, said the programme already “included projects for construction of small modular reactors, the creation of a technological platform for waste-free energy with a closed fuel cycle, the development of markets for new nuclear technologyand the creation of new nuclear fuel”.
In 2021, within the context of this programme, construction began of a fast-neutron rector and the first plant to produce new nuclear fuel went into operation and from 2024 construction will begin of the “RITM-200” small modular reactor to be used at sea for the Chukotka autonomous region.
“By 2030, we plan to secure 20 % of the world market for small capacity nuclear stations and 24 % of the world nuclear fuel market,” Novak added.
And by that time, the export of new generation nuclear fuel should reach $2.7 billion, a year, Interfax news agency reported, quoting the deputy prime minister’s presentation.
Russia’s first floating small modular nuclear reactor (SMR) is the vessel Akademic Lomonosov, with a capacity of 70 MW, brought into service in 2020 in the port of Pevek in Chukotka. Built in St. Petersburg, the vessel underwent tests in the port of Murmansk after which it was transported to Pevek by way of the Polar Sea Route.
Rosatom plans to build the first land-based SMR from 2028 in the village of Ust-Kuiga in Yakutia to provide power for the Kyuchus gold mine. The facility is to be equipped with an RITM-200N reactor with a capacity of 55 MW.
The SMR is developed as a module and is adjusted to specific measures and requires no lengthy assembly, World Nuclear Association Director General Sama Bilbao y León told Global Energy Association President Sergey Brilev in an interview at the Rosatom week during Expo-2020 in Dubai.
“This is going to be incredibly good, because it is going to be much more affordable, a much smaller Investment and the infrastructure needed to launch these reactors is going to be a lot smaller,” Sama Bilbao y Leon said.