October 2 (SeeNews) - Romanian nuclear power plant operator Nuclearelectrica [BSE:SNN] said that the project for a small modular reactor (SMR) power plant it will develop in Romania in partnership with U.S.-based NuScale has received a key approval from the Romanian National Commission for Nuclear Activities Control (CNCAN).
"The approval of the Licensing Basis Document (LBD) represents a key milestone of the Small Modular Reactor Project, which will facilitate the implementation of the licensing process for all the stages of the NuScale Power plant in Romania," Nuclearelectrica said in a filing with the Bucharest Stock Exchange on Friday.
The LBD establishes the licensing requirements for the six-module power plant project, the applicable, both domestic and international, regulatory documents, codes and standards as well as the project characteristics that ensure the fulfilment of the nuclear safety requirements and criteria.
"This is an important step forward in our journey to bringing our clean, reliable technology to Romania to help power the country," said John Hopkins, president and CEO of NuScale.
The six-module nuclear power plant (NPP) will have a gross installed power of 462 MWe and will make Romania the second country in the world after the U.S. to implement NuScale's SMR technology.
Nuclearelectrica's involvement in the project is carried out through the project firm RoPower Nuclear, of which it owns 50%. Nova Power & Gas, a subsidiary of the regional infrastructure corporation E-Infra, controls the remaining shares.
RoPower Nuclear was awarded in January a $14 million (13.1 million euro) grant by the U.S. Trade and Development Agency in October for deploying an SMR plant in Romania. Currently, RoPower and NuScale are carrying out FEED Study phase 1, which consists of a series of engineering and design activities and studies, technical analysis of the preferred site which is the former Doicesti power plant, estimation of the calendar and costs, according to the filing.
Nuclearelectrica is the operator of Romania's sole NPP Cernavoda, which currently provides roughly a fifth of the country's electricity.
Blue-chip Nuclearelectrica's shares traded 0.41% higher at 49 lei ($10.4/9.8 euro) as at 1449 CET on Monday on the Bucharest bourse.
(1 euro=4.979 lei)
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