This year 65 years have passed since the inauguration of the RA-1 at the Constituent Atomic Center the first nuclear reactor not only from Argentina but from Latin America all. The RA-1 achieved its first controlled nuclear reaction on January 17, 1958 with the work of scientists from the National Atomic Energy Commission (CNEA) and just after nine months of construction.
That first reactor is still working for researchand especially as a school reactor with which the operators of all nuclear reactors in Argentina are trained. This was the beginning: with the decision to build in the country instead of buying turnkey. The reactor and its fuel elements were developed entirely by Argentine professionals. Only enriched uranium, supplied by the United States, and a few electronic components were imported.
And it’s happening again, with the development of the CAREM reactor prototypethat it is being constructed in Lima, province of Buenos Aires. The building that will contain it covers an area of 18,500 m2, of which around 14,000 m2 correspond to the so-called ‘nuclear module’, the sector that includes the containment of the reactor, the control room and all the safety and operation systems of the reactor. the central. The civil works began on February 8, 2014, from which time CAREM has been established as the first Low and Medium Power Modular Reactor (SMR) of the world
to be officially under construction, in accordance with the parameters of the International Atomic Energy Agency
(IAEA).
“A power reactor is a reactor that is designed and built to make energy use of the same. That is, the nuclear reaction is used to use its heat and produce steam, which can be used for different purposes. The main energy use is to produce energy, which happens when that steam moves a turbine to produce energy. But steam can also be used for an industrial process. Or it can be used to involve it in the water desalination process. Or for the hydrogen production process. It can also be used to make district heating,” he explains. Ignacio de ArenazaCAREM Engineering Manager.
The SMR reactors are small, have up to 300 megawatts (MW) of electricity: CAREM, which is a demonstration plant, has 32 MW. What does this imply? That what is being finished being built is a smaller scale nuclear power plant, but it has all its components. It is a complete plant whose main objective is show and validate technology and design. Furthermore, it also serves to be shown to potential investors or clients interested in checking how the plant works.
SMRs have a great projection for the electrical supply of areas far from large urban centers or manufacturing and industrial hubs with high energy consumption. Completing CAREM and putting it into operation will make Argentina join the very small group of countries capable of providing this type of nuclear power plants.
The challenge
The Nuclear power plant construction projects are basically interdisciplinary: include the provision of services from almost all branches of engineering, various services such as software development, legal, economic, and financial advice. “We also need inspection and non-destructive testing services, which are very specialized because they have to be done in accordance with international nuclear standards, and they are very specific things,” describes de Arenaza.
“There is also the execution of the civil works, which involves concrete and steel with particular characteristics, with all types of
components. We have pumps, mechanical equipment, boiler elements, there are valves, instruments, panels, pipes, ventilation ducts, cables, special machines, cranes, control systems. We at CAREM have around 1,800 contracts already executed, mainly for the provision of services or purchases of goods, and almost all of them have been executed with Argentine suppliers, because we did all the engineering in Argentina.”
Currently in the construction stage, also carried out with Argentine suppliers, the component purchasing process is beginning to advance towards electromechanical assembly. “We are doing very strong work to develop a national supply chain with local suppliers, with large local industries, that adjust to the specific processes of the nuclear area to be able to have as many national components as possible. So that we have an idea, Our goal at CAREM is to have 70% of the work done with national components“, points out the specialist.
Added to this is that In a short time the development of what is called commercial module will begin. Then It is a much larger plant. “We are aiming for a module of around 100-120 electrical megawatts with a plant made up of four modules, which would be a plant of between 400 and 500 electrical megawatts, basically, as a standard proposal. We are currently working on collecting all the lessons learned to be able to begin the design, taking into account everything we learned during this process of design, construction and manufacturing of the demonstrator plant.”
This commercial module has economic sensebecause according to the analyzes that the specialists working at CAREM are doing, it would be a plant that would have a lot of potential, with a very competitive price in the market. The CAREM type reactors have an important projection for the electrical supply of areas far from large urban centers, and whose number of inhabitants makes it possible to transport the energy generated by the large plants located in other parts of the country (nuclear, hydroelectric , thermal) significantly increases the cost of electricity. In this way, a decentralization of generation is proposed, allowing a design of networks potentially independent of the interconnected system.
Science matters (and exports)
The development of CAREM is possible within the implementation of Argentina’s nuclear program. Because just as creating a power plant is a multidisciplinary job in itself, it needs to be contained by the development of a certain infrastructure, nuclear, which is a process that never takes less than 10 to 15 years, because an entire ecosystem needs to be generated.
“First of all it is necessary to have or develop a legal and regulatory system or framework. For this, in addition to generating laws, we must create national institutionsa regulatory body, an organization that carries out the main nuclear tasks, such as in our case the CNEA. But that is the main basis. Furthermore, you must have a system for training of resources that are going to operate a nuclear power plant. You have to have one electrical network capable of supporting a nuclear power plant, with which it is often necessary to build an improved electrical network for the powers that a nuclear power plant has. On the other hand, you have to decide what you are going to do with the fuel cycle, if the fuel is going to be purchased, if it is going to be manufactured, how it is going to be managed. And we must have a radioactive waste management system implemented,” summarizes de Arenaza.
But Argentina is also designing reactors. And for this it is necessary to have specialized human resources training not only in operation, but also in design, research and development, testing and nuclear and non-nuclear experiments. To close the virtuous circle, it is essential to have a developed industry qualified to be able to manufacture the greatest number of nuclear components within the country and capable of being certified under international nuclear standards.
