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Atmea1 safety features meet French requirements

07  February 2012

Following an 18-month review, the French nuclear safety regulator has given its preliminary approval of the safety options for the Atmea1 reactor design. The decision marks an important step to demonstrate the licensability of the 'mid sized' pressurized water reactor.

Atmea - the 50-50 joint venture formed in late 2007 between Areva and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) - requested that the French nuclear safety regulator, the Autorité De Sûreté Nucléaire (ASN), conduct a review of the safety features of the Atmea1 design.

Stabilisation after Fukushima cooling change

07 February 2012

Fukushima Daiichi 2 temperatures February 2012 (Tepco) 64x48Cooling of Fukushima Daiichi unit 2 has been upset by a change in injection rates, leading to a rise in temperature that Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) is working to gradually correct.

Kazakhstan continues front-end push

03 February 2012

Kazakhstan has posted another year of record uranium production as it furthers its diversification into value-added nuclear fuel products.

Land released for re-use at Magnox sites

03 February 2012

Berkeley - aerial - 48x64A significant part of the land at both the Oldbury and Berkeley nuclear power plant sites in the UK can now be used for other purposes following the decision by the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority to release the land for new development.

TVA looks again at Watts Bar schedule

06 February 2012

Watts Bar (TVA) 72x48Construction efficiency is the priority for Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) as it examines the Watts Bar completion project and the start-up date for the new reactor slips backwards.

Is there life after sixty?

03 February 2012

A new research program headed by the US Department of Energy will begin to investigate the case for reactor lifespans of greater than 60 years.

Privatisation of Russian state nuclear giant

02 February 2012

Vladimir Putin during interview 72x48

Having spent five years combining its nuclear power, engineering and scientific enterprises into the single entity of Rosatom, Russia now sees privatisation of the firm as part of a plan for industrial modernisation.

Industry Talk

New UK energy minister

Ed Davey has taken over as UK Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change after Chris Huhne resigned following charges of perverting the course of justice to avoid a driving penalty. Both politicians are from the Liberal Democrat Party, the junior partner in a governing coalition with prime minister David Cameron's Conservatives.

Horizon completes Oldbury land purchase

RWE and EOn's joint venture Horizon Nuclear Power has completed the purchase of land near the existing Oldbury nuclear power plant in Gloucestershire, on which it proposes to build a new plant. The land was purchased from the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority under terms agreed in a 2009 auction.

Kyushu cuts managers' wages

Citing the "severe business conditions" for power companies in Japan, Kyushu Electric Power Company has decided to cut wages of directors by 20%; of senior executive officers by 15%; and of executive officers by 15%. All of Kyushu's six large power reactors are shut down, either for periodic inspection or awaiting permission to subsquently restart.

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