As many as 60% of the required reinforcement bars have been installed and 51% of the required concrete has been poured as part of the project to build the Belarusian nuclear power plant. The information was released by Andrei Barkun, Deputy Director General, Head of the Capital Construction Office of the state enterprise Belarusian Nuclear Power Plant, during a press event on 23 March, BelTA has learned. The press event was held as part of the civil engineering expo Stroyexpo.
According to the source, since the construction process began and through March 2016 as many as 94,600 tonnes of reinforcement bars (60% of the total volume) have been installed, with 605,400m3 of concrete poured (51%). As many as 15 civil engineering companies are working at the construction site near Ostrovets, with 4,600 construction and installation personnel employed.
At present the internal protective shell of the first reactor is at the 44 meters mark while the external one is at the 35.7 meters mark. The reactor’s dome is being pre-assembled. It will be installed using a crane with the lifting capacity of 1,350 tonnes. As far as the second reactor is concerned, the internal and external protective shells have reached the 22 meters mark.
Apart from that, the construction of auxiliary facilities continues along with the construction of the facilities that will link the nuclear power plant with the national power grid.
The Belarusian nuclear power plant is a project to build an AES-2006 type nuclear power plant 18km away from Ostrovets, Grodno Oblast. The BelNPP will have two power-generating units with the total output capacity of up to 2,400MW (2x1,200MW). In line with the general contract for building the nuclear power plant the first power-generating unit is scheduled for commissioning in 2018, with the second one to go online in 2020.