Poland Selects Location for Three AP1000s

• Poland Selects Location for Three AP1000s
• TVA Board Reverses Policy; Cancels Plans to Sell Bellefonte Site
• DOE to Offer Cleanup Sites for New Energy Projects
• Urenco’S First Capacity Expansion To Be At Its US Site
• US Senate Votes To ‘Onshore’ Nuclear Fuel Production

Poland Selects Location for Three AP1000s

• Success in building them depends on control of financial risks

(NucNet contributed to this report) Polskie Elektrownie Jadrowe (PEJ) has submitted an application to the government of the northern Pomerania province seeking a location decision for Poland’s first nuclear power plant.  It will support three Westinghouse 1150 MW AP1000 PWR type nuclear reactors.

Polskie Elektrownie Jadrowe sp is a special purpose vehicle, owned by the State Treasury. Organized in 2021 its task is to build the first nuclear power plant in Poland and further reactors with a total capacity installed to about 9 GW based on proven, large-scale, pressurized water generation III(+) nuclear reactors,

The company said the decision to select a site is “one of the most important steps” in the administrative process preceding the construction of a nuclear power plant. The proposed site lies within the Choczewo municipality in Pomerania. It is on Poland’s Baltic Sea coast about 60 miles northwest of Gdansk.

The decision will give PEJ the rights to acquire necessary land both onshore and offshore for the project’s construction. It will also outline the real estate to be covered by the investment and set forth conditions for implementation, including technical, environmental, conservation, and fire protection considerations.

In November 2022, Warsaw chose US-based Westinghouse Electric to supply its AP1000 reactor technology for a three-unit nuclear power station. The first AP1000 unit is expected online in 2033 with others planned to follow in the 2040s.

Several other crucial administrative requirements have already been completed, including a decision-in-principle from the ministry of climate and environment affirming the project’s alignment with state energy policies, and a general opinion confirming the validity of safety analysis verification conducted by the national atomic energy agency. The process to obtain a decision on environmental conditions is also at an advanced stage.

Nuclear new-build plans are a central part of Poland’s drive to fundamentally realign its energy sector by 2040 by shifting from coal to nuclear energy. The coal plants are significant sources of pollution and CO2 emissions.  About 80% of Poland’s electricity comes from ageing coal plants, many of which will have to close in the coming decade. Poland wants to reduce that to 60% in the 2030s.

Poland is one of Europe’s biggest users of coal to generate electricity which also makes it one of the biggest emitters of CO2. The venture is one of Poland’s most significant public works projects ever and will provide both energy security and support for the economy.

Financing the Project Remains a Work in Progress

Poland’s political leadership has repeatedly walked up to the line of committing to new nuclear energy projects, and then stepped back when it saw the price tag.

Poland launched a national nuclear power program in 2014 which included the construction of up to 9 GW of capacity by 2050 program but stepped back from the goal at the time because it had doubts about its ability to finance the project and attract investors to it.

As recently  2020 Poland’s state-owned utility said that it could not finance a new nuclear power station. In response, in 2021 the government created PEJ to contain the risks of cost overruns and schedule delays. This move opened a pathway to the current situation where Poland has inked agreements in principle, and more, with Westinghouse for three AP1000s and with South Korea’s KHNP for four APR 1400s.

Taken together, the AP100s (3450 MW) and the APR1400s (5600 MW) combine to hit Poland’s repeatedly expressed long term goal of deploying 9000 MW of nuclear power generation to replace coal fired power plants.

There are a lot of moving pieces with some that support and others that constrain success in financing all seven PWRs. Poland’s government officials are not unaware of these issues even if in public statements they appear unflustered by them.

Westinghouse Corporate Status

Westinghouse is in the process of being acquired by a joint venture of a business unit of the Brookfield private equity fund, which is based in Canada, and Cameco, a Canadian uranium miner. The transaction is expected to close by the end of 2023.

• However, an oversight agency of the UK government has launched a review of the transition to address possible national security issues related to the Westinghouse nuclear fuel plant in the UK. It is the only plant of its kind in the UK and supplies all of the fuel the UK needs for current and future commercial nuclear reactors and the UK nuclear navy.
• Neither Brookfield nor Cameco, nor as a combined effort, have the financial horsepower to finance even 50% of the three AP1000s. Given the experience at the Vogtle site in Georgia, with its massive cost overruns and schedule delays, similar risks for the Polish project present a need for a much wider field of investors and focused project management expertise brought to the table by the EPC. In July 2021 Bechtel joined forces with Westinghouse to support the Polish nuclear new build.

Poland’s Ability to Pay for Its Share

The Polish government hasn’t said how it will commit funds to 50% of the cost for its share of the project. Will it be dipping its bucket into the same well of investors as Brookfield and Cameco?

• While Polish government officials have made aspirational remarks about US export financing, none of the agencies in the US are prepared to take on a multi-billion dollar project.
• For instance, the Development Finance Corporation has a debt ceiling and a limit on how much ($1 billion) it can invest in a single project. Any funds that it allocates for a nuclear project in Poland will likely to sent to the central bank in that country rather than the special purpose firm created to build the reactors.
• It is unclear what the congressional response would be if the ExIm Bank tries to offer a multi-billion lifeline to the Polish nuclear project that would benefit a firm expected to be owned by two Canadian firms. Given Poland’s strong emphasis on local procurement of parts and labor for the reactors, what guarantees would there be for US jobs?
• Poland wants the first AP1000 to be online by 2033 which means the financing has to be lined up and ready to write checks for long lead time procurements by 2026 at the latest. These items include the reactor pressure vessel, steam system, plus turbines, generators, and transformers for the switchyard as well as grid connections to the site. None of the heavy industry firms that offer these products are going take orders for them from Poland without cash on the barrelhead first.

Poland’s Deal with South Korea

While all this is going on Poland is also in contractual talks with a consortium of nuclear energy firms from South Korea. In November 2022  South Korea’s KHNP, with a promise of an equity investment in the project, signed MOU to build four APR1400s at a site to be determined in Poland.  However, on  August 16,2023, the size of the project was cut in half down to two APR1400s.

The company's presidents announced that a power plant consisting of two APR 1400 reactors with a total capacity of 2.8 GW will be built in 2035 in the Pątnów-Konin region in Wielkopolska about 160 miles due south of Gdansk. It will satisfy 12% of Poland's current demand for energy. By the end of the year, an agreement is to be reached on the establishment of a joint special purpose joint effort between Polish companies and a Korean technology supplier. 

• According to the Polish Press Agency, 20% of the project would be financed by capital and 80% by loans. On the South Korean side, financing would be provided by the Export-Import Bank of Korea (Kexim), South Korea’s export credit agency.
• KHNP and Westinghouse remain mired in an intellectual property dispute which has since been submitted for arbitration that could impact this deal. A settlement is possible by the end of 2023.

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TVA Board Reverses Policy; Cancels Plans to Sell Bellefonte Site

The Times-Free Press reports that seven years after voting to sell its Bellefonte nuclear plant site, the Tennessee Valley Authority has reversed itself and decided to keep the Jackson County, Alabama, power plant for another potential use. TVA directors voted last week to rescind their 2016 declaration of most of the Bellefonte site as surplus

The decision comes two years after the giant utility yanked the rug out from under real estate developer Franklin Haney’s ambitious plans to complete the two 1200 MW reactors and sell the power inside TVA’s service area to major customers like the City of Memphis.

Its possible the TVA board’s decision is a reflection of a desire not to repeat the experience which involved pleadings before a federal district court that ultimately ruled in its favors.

Not the Haney didn’t give it his best shot which included seeking to influence the future award of federal tax production credits with generous cash contributions in 2016 to President Trump’s inaugural celebration and reaching out to Trump’s then attorney Michael Cohen for other levers of influence. Even if he’d gotten past all these challenges, he still faced the need to get Part 50 construction permits from the NRC. In the end, TVA gave Haney his money back to ride off into the sunset.

What is the Future of the Bellefonte Site?

How TVA will use the 1,400-acre riverfront site is not yet determined and may not be known for years. The Times-Free Press reported that Matthew Rasmussen, TVA’s senior vice president of nuclear engineering and operations support, told the TVA board Thursday that Bellefonte is an attractive site for future power production as TVA seeks to potentially double its generation portfolio in the next three decades.

“Our intention is to preserve this for helping us to meet additional power demand,” he said during a TVA board meeting in Chattanooga. “A recently completed study has determined that the best use for the property in the near term (five years) and long term (10 years) would be new generation and energy storage.”

He added that the two giant cooling towers, the transmission lines and other power facilities in Hollywood, Alabama, make the plant site attractive for other potential power generation or storage facilities.

TVA President Jeff Lyash told the newspaper TVA is now looking at a range of options at the shuttered nuclear facility.

“What’s changed is that our load growth and power demand is growing fairly rapidly and land use and permitting is much more difficult,” Lyash said in an interview after the board meeting.

“If you have an existing site like Bellefonte that has water, transmission, rail and highway access, it’s a great asset for future building to support our system needs.”

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DOE to Offer Cleanup Sites for New Energy Projects

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has kicked off its “Cleanup to Clean Energy” initiative, an innovative effort to repurpose parts of DOE-owned lands, portions of which were previously used in the nation’s nuclear weapons program, into the sites of clean-energy generation.

These include sites that have been cleaned up from prior uses related to nuclear weapons development, testing and radioactive waste storage. Some areas on these federal sites have never been used having been set aside as buffers for various projects or which were so remote that no roads or power ever reached them. Almost all of the potential sites have legacies that go as far back as the Manhattan project to develop the atomic bomb during World War II.

Working with a diverse range of stakeholders, including industry, Federal entities, tribes, state, and local officials, DOE will explore opportunities to lease Federal land for the buildout of utility-scale clean energy projects including solar, wind, and nuclear energy projects.

Cleanup to Clean Energy will help achieve President Biden’s ambitious climate goals and the directive in Executive Order 14057 for agencies to use their properties for the development of new clean electricity generation.

“We are going to transform the lands we have used over decades for nuclear security and environmental remediation by working closely with tribes and local communities together with partners in the private sector to build some of the largest clean energy projects in the world,” said U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm.

DOE’s Office of Environmental Management, Office of Nuclear Energy, and National Nuclear Security Administration have identified about 70,000 acres for potential development at five sites:

• Hanford Site, Richland, Washington
• Idaho National Laboratory, Idaho Falls, Idaho
• Nevada National Security Site, Nye County, Nevada
• Savannah River Site, Aiken, South Carolina
• Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, Carlsbad, New Mexico

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Urenco’S First Capacity Expansion To Be At Its US Site

Urenco has approved an investment to expand enrichment capacity at its US site in New Mexico, known as UUSA.

The project will install multiple new centrifuge cascades in an existing plant which will strengthen the nuclear fuel supply chain both in the US and globally.

The first machines will come online in 2025. The firm did not disclose the total cost of the new production facilities.

Urenco’s new capacity program is a long term plan to extend and refurbish enrichment capacity at the firm’s sites to meet increasing customer demand as more countries and utility companies turn to nuclear for the first time, or seek to extend and/or diversify fuel supplies for existing nuclear operations.

The combination of the climate crisis and energy security concerns in the light of the changed geopolitical situation is resulting in a greater demand for nuclear energy and Urenco’s enrichment services.

New commitments from US customers for non-Russian fuel underpin this investment, which will provide an additional capacity of around 700 tonnes of SWU per year, a 15% cent increase at UUSA.

CEO Boris Schucht said: “Urenco is committed to supporting customers with their energy security and carbon reduction needs and this investment is a further sign of the exciting momentum behind nuclear, a reliable and low-carbon source that can maintain baseload energy and help us achieve net zero.”

“We have the licenses, designs, technology and proven capability to expand our capacity, and we are already seeing an increase in demand for our services from existing customers and new ones.

“As a leading enrichment company in the Western world, we have the duty to respond to the needs of the market. We will continue to monitor, forecast and support our customers and governments as we look to take further investment decisions across our enrichment sites.”

Swapping American Uranium for Russian

According to the annual report of the US Energy Information Administration, Russia is currently the leader for import delivery of services for uranium enrichment for American nuclear power plants. In 2022, the USA imported 3.4 million separative work units (SWU), and the volume of deliveries from the Urenco enrichment plant came to 3.9 million SWU.

While there have been calls, related to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, for direct sanctions on Rosatom, which is one of the Russian state-owned enterprises that supplies nuclear fuel to Europe and the US, the lack of an alternative supply makes this impossible at this time. Within the next few years it is expected that a combination of US and European investments in the nuclear fuel cycle will substantially diminish Russian imports.

However, India, Turkey, Egypt, and Bangladesh will likely remain as customers for Russian uranium for the next six decades. By the end of this decade, India will have six 1000 MW VVER, Turkey will have four 1200 MW VVER, and Bangladesh will have two 1200 MW VVER. China just broke ground for two new VVER in addition to other Russian built reactors that are already in revenue service.

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US Senate Votes To ‘Onshore’ Nuclear Fuel Production

(WNN) The US Senate has voted by 96-3 to approve legislation that would strengthen domestic nuclear fuel production and ensure that disruptions in uranium supply will not impact the development of advance reactors or the operation of the USA’s existing power reactor fleet.

The bipartisan amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2024 was introduced to Congress in February by Senators Joe Manchin (D-WV), John Barrasso (R-WY)  and Jim Risch (R_ID). Manchin and Barrasso are, respectively, Chairman and Ranking Member of the US Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Risch is Ranking Member of the US Senate Foreign Relations committee.

The objectives of the legislation requires the Secretary of Energy

* to establish a Nuclear Fuel Security Program,
* expand the American Assured Fuel Supply Program,
* establish a HALEU for Advanced Nuclear Reactor Demonstration Projects Program, and
* submit a report on a civil nuclear credit program, and
* to enhance programs to build workforce capacity to meet critical mission needs of the Department of Energy.

DOE to Procure Nuclear Fuel

The Nuclear Fuel Security Program envisaged in the amendment will require the US Department of Energy (DOE) to begin acquiring at least 100 tonnes of low-enriched uranium per year. It must enter into at least two contracts by the end of 2026 “to ensure diversity of supply in domestic uranium mining, conversion, enrichment, and deconversion capacity and technologies, including new capacity, among US nuclear energy companies.”

Nuclear Fuel Fabrication Process: Image: World Nuclear Association

It also requires DOE to begin acquiring at least 20 tonnes per year of HALEU by the end of 2027. The program must utilize only uranium “produced, converted, enriched, deconverted, and reduced” in the USA, or, if this is not practicable, a country “that is an ally or partner of the United States.”

HALEU is high-assay, low-enriched uranium, enriched to between 5% and 20% uranium-235. It will be required by many advanced reactor designs that are under development in both the commercial and government sectors, but such fuel is not yet commercially available, putting future projects at risk of delay.

In December last year, TerraPower said it expected operation of the its Natrium demonstration reactor at Kemmerer in Wyoming to be delayed by at least two years beyond originally planned 2028 startup because of the lack of sufficient domestic HALEU manufacturing capacity. TerraPower recently announced a collaboration with Centrus Energy Corp to ensure the Natrium demonstration reactor will have access to HALEU at the milestones necessary to meet a 2030 operation date.

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