Overhaul of Balakovo nuclear plant complete
Modernisation work on unit 4 of Russia’s Balakovo NPP has been completed after nine years of work, including the installation of over 100 new substation cabinets.
In particular, work was completed to replace the storage pool racks with racks for dense used fuel storage and structures of the fuel assembly storage compartments were also replaced.
“That work began in 2012, and it took 25 days to complete upgrading of the first compartment of the fuel pool. As experience was gained in performing such operations, more technological tools and devices were introduced and the work time was reduced to 20 days,” said Anatoly Burlakov, director of Balakovoatomenergoremont.
The workshop for the repair of electrical equipment to support the extension of the service life of unit 4 carried out preventive maintenance measures. These included replacement of control cabinets for relay protection and automation (URZA) with microprocessor panels PMS-80, and replacement of control and power cables with a total length of more than 120 km.
Some 108 cabinets of complete transformer substations were installed and adjusted, software and hardware complexes of the PTC SAR were replaced on three security systems, and more than 5000 measuring channels were tested.
During the latest outage of Balakovo 4, the main and auxiliary equipment of the reactor and turbine sections, electrical equipment and instrumentation were repaired. Amongst the other modernisation measures were upgrading of the high-pressure steam regeneration system. This involved replacing the steam pipelines of the third extraction, and drainage pipelines of the first, second, third extraction of the turbine. Their total weight was more than 16 tons. During the modernisation of the high-pressure heater pipe systems, more than 2000 coils were replaced.
All work on the repair and modernisation of the equipment was carried out jointly with specialists from the Balakovo NPP and colleagues from the Volgodonsk, Kalinin, Kursk, Novovoronezh, Smolensk, Ural branches of Atomenergoremont in full compliance with anti-epidemiological measures.
Source: Nuclear Engineering International
Photo (for illustrative purposes): Balakovo NPP / CPI BalNPP / WIkimedia / CC BY-SA 3.0
LinkedIn Partner
