The first batch of fuel assemblies were successfully installed at 16:10 Moscow time, once the Federal Environmental, Industrial and Nuclear Supervision Service of Russia (Rostechnadzor) issued the necessary license. According to plans the remaining assemblies of the total 163 are expected to be loaded within five days. This marks the physical start-up of the reactor. Following the tests at various power levels and acquiring the necessary licenses, the commercial operation is expected to start at the end of the year. The launch of the reactor will bring the share of nuclear in the Central Russia’s electricity grid to 27% thus preventing over 4 million tonnes of GHG emissions every year and boosting the region’s economy.

The NPP can be found in Voronezh oblast on Rosenergoatom’s site, which belongs to the Electroenergetics division of Rosatom. The designer of the unit in Atomenergoproekt, the Contractor is ASE Engineering Company.

The VVER-1200 is the flagship of ROSATOM’s generation III+ PWR-type reactor and the world’s only generation III+ design in series construction. Unit No. 2 at the Novovoronezh-2 NPP is going to be the third in the series following unit No. 1 at the same NPP, launched in 2016, and unit No. 1 at the Leningrad-2 NPP, launched in 2018. Several foreign countries have also chosen to use this technology, including Finland, Hungary, Bangladesh and Belarus. Overall, there are 36 units currently being developed by Rosatom in 12 countries.

Compared with the previous generation of VVER power units, the innovative III+ gen. VVER-1200 reactor has a number of safety and economic advantages. Its capacity is increased by 7%, the number of staff is reduced by 30-40%, and the reactor’s lifetime is doubled to 60 years with a possibility of extending it up to 80 years.