The EDF Group announced on Thursday the creation of a new subsidiary, Nuward, to develop and export a small modular nuclear reactor SMR, the first of which is scheduled to start construction in France in seven years.
In France, the government has made the development of these small innovative reactors a priority of its nuclear revival, with the parallel construction of powerful reactors to complete the existing nuclear fleet with six new EPR2.
EDF has been working for more than a year on a preliminary design for a small reactor intended for mass production and to position itself in the global race for this new generation of reactors: 70 to 80 reactor projects SMR (for “small modular reactor”) and AMR (advanced modular reactor) already coexist, particularly in the United States, Canada and Russia. All of them target the market for the replacement of old coal, oil or gas-fired power plants worldwide.
Wholly owned by EDF, the new subsidiary, which wants to “become the European leader in SMR” and will recruit 150 employees by 2024, “is now embarking on the preliminary design, in line with its objective of starting construction in 2030 for the benchmark plant in France,” EDF said in a statement. “In compliance with the nuclear licensing process in force in France, the safety options file (DOS) will be submitted to the French Nuclear Safety Authority in July 2023,” EDF adds.
As the location of the reference plant has not yet been selected, Nuward will participate in the evaluation and selection of potential sites. In total, more than 600 engineers and experts are expected to contribute to the development of the new SMR, including within the EDF Group and its partners, such as CEA, TechnicAtome, Naval Group, but also Framatome and Tractebel.
According to Xavier Ursat, EDF Group Executive Director in charge of Engineering and New Nuclear Projects, quoted in the release, “Nuward has been created to serve our ambition to rapidly develop this technology” and “will be able to develop a product ready in time for its market launch”.
