Main construction of Unit 4 of CGN's Zhejiang Sanao Nuclear Power Project begins

en.Wedoany.com Reported - At 8:28 on November 10, China General Nuclear Power Group (CGN) started the first concrete pouring for the nuclear island of Unit 4 of the Zhejiang Sanao Nuclear Power Project. The total pouring volume is approximately 8,820 cubic meters and is expected to last 60 hours. With the start of this construction, the main works of the unit have officially entered the construction phase, and Phase II of the Sanao Nuclear Power Project has moved into full-scale construction.

The project is located in Cangnan County, Wenzhou City, Zhejiang Province. It is the first nuclear power project in the Yangtze River Delta region to adopt Hualong One technology and also China's first nuclear power project to introduce private capital participation. Unit 4 is part of Phase II, which was approved by the state on August 19, 2024. It adopts China's independently developed third-generation nuclear power technology Hualong One. Once completed, it is expected to generate about 9 billion kWh of electricity annually, enough to meet the annual production and living electricity demand of about 1 million people.

The main construction of the nuclear island will adopt multiple automated processing and assembly equipment. The project is equipped with automated production lines for rebar and embedded parts, and is configured with embedded-part welding robots, stool-bar welding robots and an automatic anchoring block installation platform to undertake the welding and installation of nuclear island components. Among them, the embedded-part welding robot can increase the one-time welding qualification rate to 90% and improve welding efficiency by about 2 times; the stool-bar welding robot improves welding efficiency by about 4 times, with the one-time welding qualification rate also reaching 90%.

The automatic anchoring block installation platform is used for the installation of components related to nuclear island anchoring plates, achieving a one-time installation qualification rate of 100% and improving operating efficiency by about 11.5 times compared with traditional methods. In view of the large processing volume of nuclear island rebar, embedded parts and other components and the high difficulty of manual precision control, the automated production lines and robotic equipment undertake part of the repetitive processing and assembly tasks.

Unit 4 has already applied prefabricated removable retaining walls and embedded-part hot heading technology, and plans to adopt modular construction and automatic welding technologies in the future.

The Sanao Nuclear Power Project is planned to build six Hualong One units in three phases, of which four have so far been approved. Among them, Unit 1 of Phase I has been officially put into operation for power generation, and Unit 2 has completed its first nuclear fuel loading; Unit 3 of Phase II is undergoing main structure construction of the buildings surrounding the nuclear island, while Unit 4 started nuclear island concrete pouring this time. After all six units are completed, the project is expected to generate more than 54 billion kWh of electricity annually, equivalent to reducing standard coal consumption by more than 16.35 million tons and carbon dioxide emissions by nearly 50 million tons per year.