Rosatom's TVEL fuel company has dispatched all shipments to China scheduled for 2022 in order to supply the first core loading of the CFR-600 sodium-cooled pool-type fast-neutron reactor at Xiapu in China's Fujian province.

Experimental fuel assemblies for the BN-600 reactor incorporating BN-1200 fuel rods have been manufactured at the Siberian Chemical Combine in Seversk with the intention they will be loaded into the BN-600 fast neutron reactor at Beloyarsk, Russia, in 2023, Rosatom has said.

The first batch of nuclear fuel has been dispatched to China for the CFR-600 sodium-cooled pool-type fast-neutron nuclear reactor at Xiapu in China's Fujian province.

Unit 4 of Beloyarsk nuclear power plant with a BN-800 fast reactor has been connected to the grid and resumed operations after being fully loaded with uranium-plutonium mixed oxide fuel.

The UK-headquartered developer of small modular lead-cooled fast reactors, Newcleo, says it has successfully raised EUR300 million (USD316 million) and also announced it has contracted France’s Orano for feasibility studies on the establishment of a mixed plutonium-uranium oxides production plant.

Beloyarsk unit 4 has been given an overhaul after six years of operation. The fast reactor is now using 60% mixed-oxide fuel, which plant owner Rosenergoatom described as "the fuel of the future".

A contract has been signed to design the used fuel reprocessing module of the Pilot Demonstration Energy Complex facility under construction at Seversk in Russia.

Rosatom will soon submit to the Russian government its plan to invest RUB506 billion (USD7 billion) in new nuclear technologies by 2030, according to Kommersant. Of this, RUB150 billion will be from the state budget. The plan, dubbed 'New Atomic Energy', was presented for assessment to the working group of the State Council on Energy. If approved, it would be included in the government's socio-economic development strategy for the next decade, the newspaper says.

A revised mixed oxide fuel utilisation plan, based on the latest operational plan for the Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant and the MOX Fuel Fabrication Plant, has been released by Japan's Federation of Electric Power Companies. While only four Japanese reactors have so far been restarted using MOX fuel, FEPC envisages at least 12 units running on the fuel by FY2030. FEPC represents the 11 power companies, comprising nine utilities (excluding Okinawa Electric Power), Japan Atomic Power Company and the Electric Power Development Company (J-Power).

Unit 4 of the Beloyarsk nuclear power plant, Russia's BN-800 reactor, has been connected to the grid and resumed operations upon completion of scheduled maintenance. For the first time the refuelling has been carried out with uranium-plutonium fuel only.

Operation of the mixed-oxide fuel fabrication plant under construction in Rokkasho, in Aomori Prefecture, is now expected about two years later than previously planned. Japan Nuclear Fuel Limited had aimed to complete its construction in the first half of fiscal 2022 (ending March 2023), but now expects this in the first half of fiscal 2024.

Japan's Nuclear Regulation Authority has approved the modification of safety measures at Japan Nuclear Fuel Limited's mixed-oxide fuel fabrication plant under construction in Rokkasho, in Aomori Prefecture. Under the current schedule, the facility is expected to be completed between April and September 2022.