The installation of metal structures for the inner containment dome has been completed in the power unit No. 1 reactor building at the Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant (RNPP) construction site recently, a project official said.
The project is being implemented by a subsidiary of Russia’s State Atomic Energy Corporation, Rosatom. It is high on the Bangladesh government’s agenda, all the way up to the Prime Minister’s Office. The first unit will be commissioned in 2023, and the second one in 2024.
Rosatom official said, specialists of the Trest RosSEM LLC subcontractor in the PRB implemented the lifting and installation of the last tier of the inner containment dome, i.e. metal structures with a total weight of 230 tonnes were lifted by a Liebherr heavy crawler crane of 1350 tonnes lifting capacity. Its mounting in the design position (from +51.700 elevation to +60.500 elevation) completes installation of the inner containment metal structures of the reactor building.
“An important key event of 2021, i.e. mounting the inner containment dome metal structures up to +60.500 elevation has been completed at power unit No. 1. Another very important landmark has been successfully passed on the path of the Rooppur NPP construction.
The next stage of work at this power unit will include work for connecting and starting up a polar crane, assembling a reactor vessel, a steam generator, and a main circulation pipeline said,”Alexey Deriy, ASE JSC Vice-president - Director for the Rooppur NPP construction project.
The installation work on the inner containment dome mounting were carried out in two stages - from +44.100m elevation to +51.700m elevation and further on to +60.500m elevation. The lower part of the dome is a metal structure of 44m diameter and 185t weight installed at its regular place a week earlier.
In the near future, specialists will start concreting the inner containment above the +44.100 elevation.
In September, it is planned to carry out an operation to install the power unit No. 1 reactor vessel into the design position.
The Rooppur NPP site is located on the eastern bank of the Ganges River in the Pabna district at a distance of about 160 km northwest of the city of Dhaka, the capital of the Republic of Bangladesh.
The nuclear power plant will consist of two VVER-1200 reactor power units, there the life cycle is expected to be 60 years with the possible extension of the service life for another 20 years. The Russian design with VVER-1200 reactors successfully implemented at Novovoronezh NPP- 2 was selected for the first NPP in Bangladesh. This is an evolutionary GenIII+ design which fully complies with all international safety requirements.
The Rooppur NPP is planned to be built within the framework of an intergovernmental agreement between Russia and Bangladesh, which was concluded in November 2011. In the fall of 2013, the foundation stone of the future power plant was laid.
“The design of Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant has been developed in such a way that it will not succumb to any accident – natural or man-made. One of the main concerns of any nuclear power plant is its waste management. The Russian Federation will take back spent nuclear fuel of Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant and we have signed a deal in this regard with them,”an official said.
