Installation of a turbine condenser for Russia’s Brest-OD-300 lead-cooled fast reactor is underway at the construction site in Seversk, Tomsk Region. The Brest-OD-300 reactor is part of the pilot demonstration power complex (ODEK – Opitno Demonstratsionovo Energo-Kompleksa), which is being developed at the Siberian Chemical Combine (SCC) in Seversk under the Breakthrough (Proryv) project intended to demonstrate closed fuel cycle technology.
In the turbine room of the power unit, the condensate collector has already been installed in the designed position and the installation of the pipe system has begun. “Installation of the turbine condenser into the designed position constitutes one of the key events at the construction site in 2024. This is the beginning of a very important stage of work – the installation of power equipment in the turbine room,” said Ivan Babich, Director of the BREST-OD-300 power plant.
By the end of 2024, it is planned to install the main part of the condenser units (it will consist of 18 units with a total weight of 510 tonnes). Installation of the main equipment – the turbine and generator – is planned to begin in 2025. In addition to the nuclear power plant with the BREST-OD-300 reactor, ODEK will also include on-site nuclear fuel cycle facilities – a complex for the production of mixed uranium-plutonium nitride fuel, as well as a module for reprocessing irradiated nuclear fuel. At the moment, at the construction site of the BREST-OD-300 power unit, the installation of a cooling tower has been completed, the walls of the reactor building have been erected to an elevation of +16.850 meters, the reactor shaft has been erected, and the enclosing structure of the reactor vessel has been installed.
Brest (Bistrii Reaktor Estestvennoi-bezopasnosti co Svinstovim Teplonositelem – Fast Natural-safety Reactor with Lead Coolant) is a Generation IV 300 MWe power unit. It is supported by a module for the production of mixed dense nitride uranium-plutonium (SNUP) fuel, as well as a module for reprocessing irradiated fuel. SNUP fuel is based on two key components – depleted uranium, which is a by-product of uranium enrichment for nuclear reactors, and plutonium, extracted from irradiated nuclear fuel.
