China’s State Power Investment Corporation (SPIC) subsidiary Shandong Nuclear Power Group (SNPG) has installed the outer steel dome of the nuclear island containment building at unit 3 at the Haiyang NPP in China’s Shandong province.
The 1,000-tonne dome, some 41 metres in diameter and 11 metres in height, was hoisted into place on the containment walls using a 3,200-tonne crawler crane. SNPG said the operation took two hours and 12 minutes.
Installation of the dome basically completes the main structure of the nuclear island and lays the foundation for the subsequent installation of the passive containment cooling water storage tank on its upper part, SNPG noted.
The tank is part of the plant’s passive safety systems which require no operator actions to mitigate potential emergency situations. It holds water which will be used to cool the reactor in an emergency. The water can also be directed into the reactor’s used fuel pool, while the tank itself can be refilled from water stored elsewhere on site.
The Haiyang NPP hosts two AP1000 reactors (units 1&2) which entered commercial operation in 2018 and 2019 with two CAP1000 reactors (units 3&4) – the Chinese version of the Westinghouse AP1000 – under construction. Construction of Haiyang 4 began in April 2023 and first concrete was poured for the nuclear island of Haiyang 3 in July 2022. This marked the official start of construction of the first of two CAP1000 pressurised water reactors planned as Phase II at the site. The planned construction period is 56 months, with the two units scheduled to be fully operational in 2027.
