KHNP, NASA sign cooperation agreement

Thursday, 28 January 2016

Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power (KHNP) has signed a memorandum of understanding with Nucleoeléctrica Argentina SA (NASA) for technological cooperation.

The MOU was signed in Buenos Aires yesterday by KHNP CEO Cho Seok and NASA vice president Sebastian Estrada (Image: KHNP)

Under the MOU, the two companies will cooperate in nuclear power plant engineering, construction, operation and maintenance, KHNP announced today.

KHNP said it has also held talks with NASA about participating in its planned project to refurbish the Embalse nuclear power plant. The project would not only extend the Candu-6 pressurized heavy water reactor's operating life by 25 years but will also increase its power output from 648 MWe to 683 MWe.

The Korean company has already completed a major refurbishment of its Wolsong 1 - also a Candu 6 - in 2013. That unit was taken out of operation in April 2009 for an extended maintenance outage that included replacement of all its pressure tubes and calandria tubes. The reactor came back into operation in July 2011 with its performance raised from 629 MWe to 657 MWe.

Candu reactors are designed to undergo refurbishment after about 25 years of operation, requiring a major outage but allowing reactor lives to be extended by up to 30 years. For all Candu reactors, this involves complete retubing.

In September 2010, an MOU on cooperation in new nuclear projects and life extensions of existing plants was signed between South Korea and Argentina.

Argentina has three operating nuclear power reactors - two at Atucha and one at Embalse - as well as three proposed plants.

Researched and written
by World Nuclear News