Floating nuclear power stations () are vessels designed by Rosatom, the Russian state-owned nuclear energy corporation. They are self-contained, low-capacity, floating nuclear power plants. Rosatom plans to mass-produce the stations at shipbuilding facilities and then tow them to ports near locations that require electricity.
The work on such a concept dates back to the MH-1A in the United States, which was built in the 1960s into the hull of a World War II Liberty Ship, which was followed on much later in 2022 when the United States Department of Energy funded a three-year research study of offshore floating nuclear power generation. The Rosatom project is the first floating nuclear power plant intended for mass production. The initial plan was to manufacture at least seven of the vessels by 2015. On 14 September 2019, Russia’s first-floating nuclear power plant, Akademik Lomonosov, arrived to its permanent location in the Chukotka region. It started operation on 19 December 2019.
History
The project for a floating nuclear power station began in 2000, when the Ministry for Atomic Energy of the Russian Federation (Rosatom) chose Severodvinsk in Arkhangelsk Oblast as the construction site, Sevmash was appointed as general contractor. Construction of the first power station, the Akademik Lomonosov, started on 15 April 2007 at the Sevmash Submarine-Building Plant in Severodvinsk. In August 2008 construction works were transferred to the Baltic Shipyard in Saint Petersburg, which is also responsible for the construction of future vessels. Akademik Lomonosov was launched on 1 July 2010, at an estimated cost of 6 billion rubles (232 m$). In 2015 construction of a second vessel starting in 2019 was announced by Russia's state nuclear corporation Rosatom.
On 27 July 2021 Rosatom signed an agreement with GDK Baimskaya LLC for energy delivery for Baimskaya copper mining operations. Rosatom suggests delivering up to three new floating power plants (with fourth being in reserve), all using the latest RITM-200M 55 MWe reactors, currently serving on Project 22220 icebreakers. These are to be docked at Cape Nagloynyn, Chaunskaya Bay port and connected to the Baimskaya mine by 400 km long 110 kV line through Bilibino. According to Rosatom, production of the first new reactors by Atomenergomash has already started. In August 2022, construction of the first hull started in China, planned to be delivered to Russia in 2023 for installation of reactors and equipment.
On 31 December 2021 Rosatom announced that these four new floating plants will carry a new, slightly improved version of RITM-200 cores, named RITM-200S, currently in development. TVEL has been charged with development of new fuel assemblies for its improved core. Each barge will produce 106 MWe of power.
Licensing
Makers of mobile nuclear power plants need to obtain a manufacturing license. This allows the producer to create at a shipyard office various flatboat mounted atomic power plants of a similar structure which are to be worked at unassigned destinations by service organizations. The attributes of the locales at which the plants are to work are determined by the producer as a site-related instruction. Since seaward atomic power plants are profoundly exposed to various covering administrative purviews, steps have been taken to structure the interagency coordination.
Technical characteristics
The floating nuclear power station is a non-self propelled vessel. It has length of , width of , height of , and draught of . The vessel has a displacement of 21,500 tonnes and a crew of 69 people.
Each vessel of this type has two modified KLT-40 naval propulsion reactors together providing up to 70 MW of electricity or 300 MW of heat, or cogeneration of electricity and heat for district heating, enough for a city with a population of 200,000 people. Because of its ability to float and be assembled in extreme weather conditions, it can provide heat and power to areas that do not have easy access to these amenities because of their geographic location. It could also be modified as a desalination plant producing 240,000 cubic meters of fresh water a day. Smaller modification of the plant can be fitted with two ABV-6M reactors with the electrical power around 18 MWe (megawatts of electricity).