Russia built Floating Nuclear Thermal and Power Plant

Russia's ‘Floating Nuclear Thermal and Power Plant’ (PATES)

The Russian-built Akademik Lomonosov was issued a 10-year operating license in June and is slated to be towed to its final destination – the small Arctic port of Pevek in the remote Chukotka Region. There it will begin supplying heat and electricity to local consumers before year’s end.

The plant is based on long-established technology. The plant’s reactor is a nesting doll of protective layers, from the hermetic body of the fuel rod assembly preventing uranium fuel from seeping into the core, and up to the sealed walls enclosing the nuclear-related rooms, in which there is negative air pressure to prevent anything from leaking out.

The FNPP boasts two KLT-40S reactors, capable of producing up to 70 megawatts of electricity and 50 gigacalories an hour of heat energy. The reactors are a new modification of the KLT-40M units used by the Taymyr-class shallow-draft nuclear-powered icebreakers. While the main task of the FNPP is to provide remote industrial sites, as well as the offshore gas and oil platforms, with electric energy. A single unit can produce enough energy and heat to meet the demands of a city with 100,000 population.

FNPP's operational lifespan is 40 years, which can be extended to up to 50 years. Following the end of its life cycle, the unit can be taken away for reactor replacement and maintenance, without leaving any hazardous materials behind.

The ship can be towed to wherever it is needed, moored and connected with the land infrastructure, where it can stay for decades, receiving on-site maintenance as needed.

KLT-40S reactors are designed so that even if all the human operators suddenly fell unconscious and the power supply was cut, it would still shut itself down if necessary. Additional safety measures are also in place, including spring-loaded neutron-absorbing rods which push inside the core and drive it subcritical in case of power failure.

The ship itself was also designed with safety in mind and given features for extra endurance. The superstructure ensures that force from any kind of collision would be spread away from the reactors, be it a collision with another ship, rocks, or even a falling aircraft. Its engineers say the Akademik Lomonosov would also be able to withstand severe storms with winds of 80 meters per second.

Scale matters

The key difference between a regular ground-based nuclear plant and one placed on a ship is scale. The blocks of the Chernobyl plant were rated to produce 1,000MW of electric power each – whereas the two KLT-40S reactors on board the Akademik Lomonosov produce about 70MW combined. Such are the limitations of nuclear real estate on a ship.

A small nuclear reactor can compete with the conventional propulsion systems of a ship. If you want your submarine to stay hidden from the enemy for weeks and months in a row, you have no other choice but to go nuclear. Need the extra power to smash your 21,000-ton icebreaker through thick ice? Uranium may be better than diesel for the job. In fact, KLT-40S come from the Russian nuclear icebreaker fleet, where the reactor had a venerable operational record of over three decades and somehow managed not to turn the Arctic into a radioactive wasteland.

However, a dedicated floating power plant needs to compete with other types of power plants, and when it comes to producing cheap power, scale is the king. First, you sink millions of dollars and years of construction work into one large facility and then spend years with return on the investments by providing affordable energy to as many consumers as possible. The small-scale PATES is the opposite – relatively quick to build but generating power at high cost.

Niche market

Where the ship can be economically feasible – at least according to the estimates of the producer, Rosenergoatom – is in really remote locations, preferably with a harsh climate.

“Our calculations show that if its capacity is used 100 percent, the PATES is competitive with other sources of power in Chukotka,” Pavel Ipatov, the deputy head of the company, told RT.

The cost of an already expensive regular power plant, nuclear or otherwise, may become astronomical in the middle of nowhere. Think of transporting building materials and equipment a few thousand kilometers by sea. Bonuses for working in freezing weather. Storage for extra fuel that would be needed in case strong storms cut the facility from the regular supplies for an extra month or two. Suddenly, the price of electricity generated by a factory-ready floating plant does not seem that high.

Russian project

Russia is unique in having an abundance of highly remote spots along its 24,000km Arctic coastline, where people live to harvest some of the region’s mineral riches. This explains why Russia has its nuclear icebreaker fleet, from which the PATES project stems.

Pevek, the destination of the Akademik Lomonosov, is close to one of the largest reserves of tin in Russia, while the greater Chukotka area is famous for gold mining. The location also has an ageing energy infrastructure. There are two big power plants there – a nuclear plant built in 1974 and a coal plant operating since 1944. The local energy grid is isolated, meaning there will be shortages if one of the plants shuts down – hence the floating power plant as a stopgap.

Rosenergoatom is already developing a more advanced version of the floating nuclear power plant which will have the latest generation of Russian nuclear-propelled icebreaker reactors installed. The Russian Arctic will likely be the target market, although the company also pitches its niche products to island nations that have few energy resources of their own.