Dome Hoisting Completed for Unit 5 of Chashma Nuclear Power Plant in Punjab Province, Pakistan

en.Wedoany.com Reported - On November 10, the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) held a dome hoisting ceremony for the reactor building of Unit 5 (C-5) at the Chashma Nuclear Power Plant in the Mianwali District of Punjab Province, marking the completion of a major milestone in the project's main construction. Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, representatives from the Chinese side, and personnel from project-related institutions attended the ceremony. The unit has a designed generating capacity of 1200 MW and is scheduled to begin power generation in September 2030.

The hoisting completed this time was for the dome structure at the top of the reactor building. With the dome in place, the main civil construction of the reactor building has entered its final stage, and subsequent work will gradually shift to interior construction of the building and installation of nuclear island equipment. This milestone comes less than three and a half years after the project's groundbreaking ceremony in July 2023, and the Pakistani government states that construction progress is ahead of the original schedule.

Chashma Unit 5 adopts China's independently developed Hualong One (HPR1000) third-generation pressurized water reactor technology and is one of the large nuclear power projects under construction in Pakistan. According to technical materials published by the Pakistan Nuclear Regulatory Authority, the unit features a double-layer containment structure and is equipped with a reactor safety filtered venting system, with a design life of 60 years. The project has a designed capacity of 1200 MW, making it the largest single-unit project among the existing units at the Chashma Nuclear Power Plant.

The project is being implemented by the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission in cooperation with Chinese engineering and technical forces. In July 2023, the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council of Pakistan approved the project with a total investment set at 1.047988 trillion Pakistani rupees, including credit from Chinese suppliers. China Zhongyuan Engineering Corp. is participating in the project implementation.

The Pakistan Nuclear Regulatory Authority issued the construction license for the C-5 unit to the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission on December 26, 2024. On September 17, 2026, Pakistan and the International Atomic Energy Agency signed the safeguards agreement for the unit, clarifying arrangements for the unit to be subject to relevant nuclear material safeguards, thereby providing an institutional basis for regulatory work during the subsequent construction and operation phases.