Delay to Dukovany deal also pushes back the entire project schedule in Czechia, says EDU II chief

The delay to signing the final agreement for the construction of new nuclear units at Dukovany is also pushing back the schedule for the entire project and its individual phases. The commissioning of the new reactors is therefore also set to be delayed by months. According to the current schedule, the first reactor should come online at the turn of 2036 and 2037. Petr Závodský, chairman of the board of Elektrárna Dukovany II (EDU II), the company responsible for the nuclear tender, said this at the NextGen Energetika 2035+ conference in Prague today. He also pointed to rising project costs.

The final agreement with KHNP was originally scheduled to be signed on Wednesday, 7 May, but the Regional Court in Brno blocked the signing the day before with a preliminary injunction. It issued the injunction at the request of French company EDF, which filed a lawsuit challenging the decision of the Office for the Protection of Competition (ÚOHS). The office had ruled that the tender was in order. According to Závodský, the delay is pushing back not only the completion of the first unit at Dukovany, but also construction of the second reactor and other planned units at Temelín.

The court has not yet ruled on EDF's lawsuit. Elektrárna Dukovany II, which is responsible for the nuclear tender, will file an appeal against the injunction with the Supreme Administrative Court (NSS). According to Závodský, costs for the entire project are also rising as a result of the delay. ČEZ CEO Daniel Beneš said last week that a delay of several months could cost as much as hundreds of millions of crowns.

"Every month of delay will certainly have an impact on the project," Závodský said.

He rejected comments that a delay of several months would have no impact on a project that has been under way for more than ten years. "If you have a project with a schedule that includes precisely defined licensing periods and the like, then if one phase is delayed by several months, completion of the construction will also be pushed back by several months," he noted.

He reiterated that EDU II is currently preparing an appeal against the court's preliminary injunction. The company has until Wednesday, 20 May, to file it. "I think we have strong enough arguments for the Higher Administrative Court to overturn the Regional Court's decision on the preliminary injunction," the head of EDU II said. In his view, the Regional Court did not sufficiently consider the public interest in the entire project. "There is currently no project with a greater public interest," he added.

KHNP won the Czech nuclear tender last year, with the government choosing its bid over those from EDF and Westinghouse. The construction of new nuclear units in Czechia is set to be the largest contract in the country's history. At current prices, the cost of the currently preferred plan to build two reactors at Dukovany is 407 billion crowns.