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Floating nuclear power unit for Chukotka moors in Russia's Murmansk

The specialists will begin preparing the power unit for nuclear fuel uploading, and then the nuclear unit will undergo mooring tests

ST. PETERSBURG, May 21. /TASS/. The Akademik Lomonosov floating nuclear unit moored in Murmansk on Saturday, the Baltic Shipyard’s press service said.

The Akademik Lomonosov floating power unit arrived on Thursday in the Murmansk port - thus finishing a voyage from St. Peterburg.

"The Baltic Shipyard’s specialists welcomed the floating power unit in Murmansk," the press service said. "Those are about 50 professionals from the shipyard."

The specialists will begin preparing the power unit to nuclear fuel uploading, and then the nuclear unit will undergo mooring tests.

The Akademik Lomonosov will stay in Murmansk to next year. The second stage of towing - to Pevek - is due in 2019. Before that, the shipyard’s specialists will do necessary works in Murmansk.

First floating nuclear power plant

The Akademik Lomonosov floating power unit is a project of transportable power units of small capacity. The power unit may work as a part of a floating nuclear heat power plant and is a new-class energy source, based on Russian technologies of nuclear shipbuilding. The plant has two reactors, which can produce up to 70 megawatts of electric energy and 50 gig calories/hour of heat energy in the nominal working mode, which is sufficient for a city with population of about 100,000.

In 2019, the power plant will replace the outdated Bilibinskaya nuclear power plant and the Chaunskaya heat power plant. Thus, the new power plant would be the world’s northernmost nuclear power plant, which will be working at the Pevek port in Chukotka.

The floating nuclear power unit is the first ever mobile transportable power unit of small capacity. It is made for the Extreme North and Far East regions, where it will produce energy for distanced industrial facilities, ports, gas and oil platforms in the open sea.