A joint venture between Kazakhstan’s Kazatomprom and China’s General Nuclear Power Corporation (CGN) will start producing nuclear fuel assemblies for the Chinese reactor fleet in 2021, the Kazakh company told NucNet.

A new fuel assembly factory will produce the fuel based on technology provided by France’s Framatome, Kazatomprom said.

Kazatomprom said a new company, Ulba-TVS, jointly owned by Kazatomprom and CGN, is responsible for the construction and future operation of the facility near Ust-Kamenogorsk in eastern Kazakhstan.

All assembly production will be supplied to China for the operation of its pressurised water reactors, the Kazakh company told NucNet. The manufacturing facility will have an annual capacity of 200 tonnes.

The plant is undergoing certification procedures expected to be completed in 2021, which will allow the production of fuel assemblies to begin.

Ulba-TVS was set up in 2015 at the site of Kazatomprom’s existing Ulba Metallurgical Plant in Ust-Kamenogorsk.



Source: article written by Mattia Baldoni, Kamen Kraev and published originally on NUCNET at the following link