A two-month outage for fuel replacement has ended at the Dukovany nuclear plant in Czechia

A two-month planned outage of the first unit at the Dukovany Nuclear Power Plant, involving the replacement of some of its fuel, inspections and equipment servicing, ended overnight. The plant’s energy workers also prepared the unit to operate at an increased output of 512 megawatts (MW), 12 MW more than before. According to a company statement issued today by ČEZ, all four Dukovany generating units are now in operation.

The unit stopped generating electricity on August 16. The generator of the first turbine-generator set began supplying electricity to the grid again on Thursday at 23:30. Energy workers connected the second turbine-generator set today at 2:48, bringing the outage to an end. Nuclear plant spokesperson Jiří Bezděk said. The unit is expected to reach full output next week.

„The work was extremely demanding, but we managed to keep it on schedule or even get ahead of it. We are currently increasing reactor output gradually,“ said Roman Havlín, director of the Dukovany plant.

He added that inspections, tests and verification would continue for several days before the unit reaches its new nominal output.

After that, three of the four Dukovany units will be operating at the new, increased output of 512 MW. The plant’s final unit will be ready to operate at the higher output after a planned outage that is due to begin at the end of the year.

„Outages at our units are now about much more than just replacing fuel. Our goal is to ensure the safe and reliable operation of all our units for at least 60 years. This also involves a large number of inspections and investment in equipment upgrades,“ said Bohdan Zronek, a member of ČEZ’s board of directors and director of its nuclear energy division.

When the Dukovany units began operating between 1985 and 1987, they had an electrical output of 440 MW. Later, energy workers increased the output of each Dukovany unit to 500 MW through equipment upgrades.

The Czech Republic has six nuclear units at two power plants. Dukovany generated 14.3 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity last year and 11.5 TWh so far this year. Temelín exceeded 16 TWh last year. The first unit at Temelín is currently supplying electricity, while the second has been in a planned outage since October 11, with some staff moving there from Dukovany.

In July, the government decided to build two new nuclear reactors at Dukovany. They are to be built by South Korean company KHNP, which won the tender. The contract with the company is expected to be signed by the end of March next year. The first of the new reactors at Dukovany is expected to be completed in 2036.