OPG prepares for arrival of Harriet Brooks at Darlington

Friday, 9 August 2024

The highly specialised excavating machine, also known as a 'mole', is being manufactured in Europe and will be used to drill the condenser cooling water tunnel path. Although it is not expected to be on site until next summer, DNNP's team has already completed a retaining wall for the machine's launch shaft.

Ontario Power Generation (OPG) announced in March that early phase works for the Darlington New Nuclear Project to construct the first of up to four BWRX-300 SMRs had been completed on time and on budget, clearing the way for the main site preparation work to begin. This summer has seen drilling begin for the reactor building shaft retaining wall. Work has begun on the on-site fabrication and pre-assembly buildings where components for the plant will be fabricated. OPG has shared a video update of progress at the site.

The first part of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission's hearings on OPG's application for a licence to construct the first unit is to take place this September, with the second hearing in January. Pending regulatory approval, OPG has previously said the project will be ready for nuclear construction work to begin in 2025. The first SMR unit is expected to be in commercial operation by the end of 2029, with the rest of the units expected to come online in the mid-2030s.

Harriet Brooks

 

The tunnel boring machine is currently being manufactured in Europe (Image: OPG)

After more than 100 name submissions and a vote for the best, the team settled on Harriet Brooks as the name of the new tunnelling machine. (A previous tunnel boring machine used to create a 10.2-kilometre-long tunnel to increase generating capacity at the Sir Adam Beck hydro complex in Niagara Falls was known as Big Becky in honour of Sir Adam Beck, the first chairman of OPG predecessor company the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario.)

Harriet Brooks (Image: OPG)

Harriet Brooks was the first woman to receive a master’s degree from Montreal's McGill University in 1901. Brooks discovered that one element could change into another element through radioactive decay and - while she was still a student - was one of the first people to discover the radioactive gas radon. She worked under Ernest Rutherford and Marie Curie, and held a variety of university positions, including at McGill and Barnard College in the USA, as well as working with JJ Thomson at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, England.