Construction milestones for Barakah 2

The United Arab Emirates' second nuclear unit, Barakah 2, has reached major construction milestones including the completion of the steel containment liner plate, placement of the upper dome, and the lifting into place of the unit's pressurizer.

The United Arab Emirates' (UAE's) second nuclear unit, Barakah 2, has reached major construction milestones including the completion of the steel containment liner plate, placement of the upper dome, and the lifting into place of the unit's pressurizer.

Barakah 2's upper dome is now in place (Image: Enec)

The containment liner plate is a cylindrical steel shell forming the inner wall, ceiling and floor lining of the reinforced concrete reactor containment building. The containment building is topped by the steel-reinforced concrete structure of the upper dome. The containment building and liner plate will house the reactor vessel itself, and form the reactor's third radiological protective barrier after the fuel rods and reactor coolant system.

The 2000 tonne containment liner plate, measuring nearly 60 metres in height - 77 metres including the dome - and 45 metres in diameter, has been constructed in stages. Installation of the 19 separate liner rings, each 3 metres in height, has taken about 15 months to complete. Over the coming months the liner plate will be covered in concrete to complete the reactor containment building structure.

Barakah 2's pressurizer, which weighs nearly 140 tonnes and is over 16 metres long, has been lifted into position in the reactor containment building ready for assembly over the coming months. The component, which maintains the pressure inside the reactor coolant system, is one of the last major components of the reactor coolant system to be placed in the containment building.

The roof frame for unit 2's control room has also been lifted into place, the Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation (Enec) said.

"These milestones for unit 2 are part of the defence-in-depth safety features in the design," Enec CEO Mohamed Al Hammadi said.

Enec said that Barakah 1, the first of four Korean-designed APR1400 pressurized water reactors being built at the site by a prime contractor consortium led by Korea Electric Power Corporation, is now over 81% complete, while unit 2 is almost 60% complete. Enec is currently working to obtain approval from the UAE's Federal Authority for Nuclear Regulation for operating licences for the first two units, scheduled to start up in 2017 and 2018 respectively. All four units are scheduled to be complete by 2020.

Researched and written
by World Nuclear News