Framatome wins US contracts

26 February 2019


France’s Framatome on 21 February signed a contract to provide fuel fabrication and related services to unit 2 at the US Palo Verde Generating Station near Phoenix, Arizona. Arizona Public Service (APS), which operates and owns 29.1% percent of Palo Verde, is the largest power producer in the USA. The first reload of Framatome fuel will be delivered in the spring of 2020.

This is the first time Framatome will supply full reload quantities of fuel to Palo Verde, a plant originally designed by Combustion Engineering. Palo Verde will use Framatome’s Advanced CE16 HTP fuel design. Previously, Framatome supplied eight Lead Test Assemblies to Palo Verde in 2008. Framatome will build the fuel assemblies for Palo Verde at its fuel manufacturing facility in Richland, Washington. Framatome will also provide fuel engineering support services from its US headquarters in Lynchburg, Virginia. The Palo Verde Generating Station’s three pressurised water reactors, each with a net capacity to produce 1,411MWe, provide more than 70% of Arizona’s clean air energy.

The previous day, Framatome signed a multi-million dollar contract to perform ultra-high-pressure (UHP) cavitation preening of the reactor vessel closure head of the Wolf Creek nuclear power plant in Kansas. This operation is currently scheduled for spring 2021. In addition to the surface mitigation peening services, Framatome will conduct a range of non-destructive examinations of the reactor components and perform ageing management inspections. UHP cavitation peening is designed to prevent primary water stress corrosion cracking. The process uses ultra-high-pressure water jets to generate vapor bubbles that collapse with enough force to create beneficial compression of the components’ surfaces. This surface compression improves components’ material properties and enhances resistance to corrosion and other types of degradation. The Wolf Creek Generating Station is Kansas’s only NPP, providing energy for two utility owners’ customers in both Kansas and Missouri. 



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