MURMANSK, October 3. /TASS/. Rosenergoatom finished loading fuel on the first floating nuclear power plant in the world by the name of "Akademik Lomonosov" in Murmansk, the Rosenergoatom press service informed on Wednesday.
"The last key stage before the physical launch of the floating nuclear power station is over - the loading of nuclear fuel into both reactors," the company informed.
Specialists of the Baltic power plant carried out these works. Before the end of the year, Rosenergoatom plans to finish all final technological operations on the power plant. The next key stage will be its physical launch in October-November of the current year, after receiving a permit from Rostekhnadzor. After that, the nuclear unit will undergo mooring tests.
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 Gcal/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In 2019, the power plant will replace the outdated Bilibinskaya nuclear power plant and the Chaunskaya heat power plant.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.