FLOATING NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS

Apart from over 200 nuclear reactors powering various kinds of ships, Rosatom in Russia has set up a subsidiary to supply floating nuclear power plants ranging in size from 70 to 600 MWe. These will be mounted in pairs on a large barge, which will be permanently moored where it is needed to supply power and possibly some desalination to a shore settlement or industrial complex. The first will have two 40 MWe reactors based on those in icebreakers and will operate at Severodvinsk, in the Archangel region. Five of the next seven will be used by Gazprom for offshore oil and gas field development and for operations on the Kola and Yamal peninsulas. One is for Pevek on the Chukotka peninsula, another for Kamchatka region, both in the far east of the country. Further far east sites being considered are Yakutia and Taimyr. Electricity cost is expected to be much lower than from present alternatives.
The Russian KLT-40S is a reactor well proven in icebreakers and now proposed for wider use in desalination and, on barges, for remote area power supply. Here a 150 MWt unit produces 35 MWe (gross) as well as up to 35 MW of heat for desalination or district heating. These are designed to run 3-4 years between refuelling and it is envisaged that they will be operated in pairs to allow for outages, with on-board refuelling capability and used fuel storage. At the end of a 12-year operating cycle the whole plant is taken to a central facility for overhaul and removal of used fuel. Two units will be mounted on a 20,000 tonne barge. A larger Russian factory-built and barge-mounted reactor is the VBER-150, of 350 MW thermal, 110 MWe. The larger VBER-300 PWR is a 325 MWe unit, originally envisaged in pairs as a floating nuclear power plant, displacing 49,000 tonnes. As a cogeneration plant it is rated at 200 MWe and 1900 GJ/hr.