ČEZ has completed the first third of the outage of the fourth unit in Dukovany

16. 11. 2023

Source: PRO-ENERGY magazine

The 35th outage of Unit 4 began in mid-October. It was necessary to lower the reactor level to 8 m for planned maintenance of the primary circuit equipment. Therefore, power engineers had to remove all 349 fuel and control assemblies from the reactor to the adjoining spent fuel pool before lowering the water level. They should also successfully complete the cleaning of one of the six steam generators of mineral deposits by the end of the week, which has a positive benefit on the condition and efficiency of the facility. This is one of the long-term measures to ensure at least 60 years of operation of the plant, which is being carried out by ŠKODA JS and the French company Framatome.

The outage of Unit 4 has also been used by the technicians to replace the first ever seventeen-metre-long section of raw water refill pipeline for the second central pumping station with a diameter of 1 m, at a cost of several million crowns. Due to the simultaneous nominal operation of the third production unit, the technicians had to provide an alternative method of refilling during the repair period. " During the holidays, we have already replaced 4 flaps with a diameter of 1.8 m, which separate the circulating raw water of the first and second double block, and we will replace the remaining 4 flaps during the next joint outage. As part of the preparation of the power plant for at least 60 years of safe and reliable operation, we are also looking at the equipment that is underground, directly in the ground or in the technological channels, which are several tens of kilometres around the plant," revealed Roman Havlín, Director of the Dukovany Nuclear Power Plant.

Source: PRO-ENERGY magazine, original here