Country now has long-term contracts for fuel from a Russian supplier
Prague, Feb 15 (ČTK) — There is no need for the Czech Republic to build a nuclear fuel plant as it might “become a closed market” for other fuel suppliers, Pavel Janík, the head of the Czech office of US-Japanese company Westinghouse Electric Company, told the Czech News Agency today.
Westinghouse had been supplying fuel to Czech nuclear plant Temelín until the year 2010. It was one of the bidders for Temelín’s expansion. The tender to build new units at Temelín was cancelled last year.
The Industry and Trade and Finance Ministries are, however, preparing a national action plan of nuclear energy development in which finalizing the fuel production process in the Czech Republic or in the close vicinity is an optimal way of ensuring safe fuel shipments for the country.
“It would be an optimal solution to have here a nuclear fuel (fabrication) plant,” Industry and Trade Minister Jan Mládek (Social Democrats, CSSD) said at the end of January.
The Czech Republic may have an ambition to supply uranium to someone who will enrich it and send it back to the country for finalization, Mládek said.
Miroslav Kyncl of the ministry’s press department told ČTK that the Industry Ministry wants to prepare a study by the end of the year that will make it easier to decide on whether a nuclear fuel fabrication facility is an optimal option.
“The document will follow up the preliminary study that was prepared for the ministry in 2014, said Kyncl.
“A long-term reliability of nuclear fuel supplies can easily be ensured via cooperation with alternative suppliers, which is a common practice worldwide,” Janík said.
“Other options might extend the existing Czech monopoly and the Czech Republic might become a closed market,” he added.
Russian company TVEL, a part of the group Rosatom, has been supplying fuel to the Czech Republic’s Temelín and Dukovany nuclear plants.
Ladislav Kříž, the spokesman for power group ČEZ, which operates the nuclear plants, said ČEZ does not see it as a likely and at the same time economical scenario that the Czech Republic would have a plant that would supply nuclear fuel for Czech units only. “The facility would have to supply (fuel to) more states,” said Kříž.
ČEZ and TVEL have signed a contract on fuel supplies to Temelín until 2020, with an option for another up to 10 years.
ČEZ may call a new tender this year. “TVEL as well as Westinghouse are capable of supplying fuel to Temelín. This year, we will apparently take a decision on fuel shipments after the year 2020. We suppose we’ll test the market and put up a tender,” said Kříž.
The contract between ČEZ and TVEL for fuel deliveries to Dukovany has been closed until the end of the existing units’ operations.
