New agreement enables continued development of Polish plant

Wednesday, 2 April 2025

In November 2022, the then Polish government selected Westinghouse AP1000 reactor technology for construction at the Lubiatowo-Kopalino site in the Choczewo municipality in Pomerania in northern Poland. In September 2023, Westinghouse, Bechtel and Polskie Elektrownie Jądrowe (PEJ) - a special-purpose vehicle 100% owned by Poland's State Treasury - signed an 18-month engineering services contract under which Westinghouse and Bechtel will finalise a site-specific design for a plant featuring three AP1000 reactors.

However, that contract expired at the end of March without a new agreement being concluded.

PEJ has now announced that an Engineering Development Agreement (EDA) - the so-called 'bridge agreement' - has been signed, establishing the framework for cooperation between PEJ and the Westinghouse-Bechtel Consortium for the upcoming months.

"The EDA opens the next stage in the construction of Poland's first nuclear power plant and enables continuation of project work, which will facilitate obtaining the necessary administrative decisions, licences and permits, etc, and initiate a further phase of in-depth geological surveys at the project site," it said.

PEJ added: "The agreement reached and the compromise worked out provide a solid and sustainable foundation for the continuation of partnership under the project. The Engineering Development Agreement will be signed after completing the governance process. Hence, the planned project work to inform the documents for Poland's first nuclear power plant required by applicable laws continue according to the adopted schedule."

"Today we are one step further in implementing the project of building the first Polish nuclear power plant," said Wojciech Wrochna, Government Plenipotentiary for Strategic Energy Infrastructure, Secretary of State in the Ministry of Industry. "The completion of negotiations between Polskie Elektrownie Jądrowe and the consortium of Westinghouse and Bechtel is a confirmation of our common determination to implement this undertaking.

"The signing of the so-called bridge agreement opens the next stage of our cooperation, which will allow for the effective implementation of the design process and then the construction of this facility, which is key to energy security."

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said: "Negotiations on the bridge agreement with contractors have been completed and I would like to thank Minister Marzena Czarnecka and the team that worked on a better form of agreement. The first piece of good news: we are continuing the construction of the nuclear power plant. The second piece of good news: we have reached an agreement with our American partners in such a way that this agreement is much better from our point of view.

In late March, President Andrzej Duda signed a bill that designates funds from the national budget for the construction of Poland's first nuclear power plant. Under the bill, PEJ is set to receive PLN60.2 billion (USD15.5 billion) in public funding between 2025 and 2030. The remaining funding will be obtained from financial institutions, primarily foreign institutions supporting exports originating from equipment suppliers' countries, including export credit agencies, in particular the American export credit agency Export-Import Bank of the United States.

The aim is for Poland's first AP1000 reactor to enter commercial operation in 2033.