A containment airlock for the second power unit has been delivered to the construction site of the Rooppur NPP in Bangladesh. It belongs to the nuclear fuel handling route of the nuclear power plant.
The airlock is an essential structure of the reactor containment. It is a cylinder-shaped chamber with two airtight doors, one inside and the other outside the containment area. When assembled, the airlock weighs 235 tonnes and is 12.7 meters long and 10 meters in diameter. Its primary function is to hold radioactive substances inside the containment area and provide fire protection. When the nuclear power plant is in normal operation, the airlock serves as a gate for the delivery of maintenance parts and materials and fresh nuclear fuel and removal of spent fuel.
The containment airlock was transported from the Rooppur NPP port to the site of Unit 2 using a Goldhofer self-propelled module. The next step is to lift the airlock to its planned position at Level 25 with the help of a powerful crane Liebherr LR 11350. Then it will be installed and fixed in place in the reactor building. This operation is considered to be one of the most precise and labor-intensive in building a power unit.
“The Rooppur project is moving forward as we are continuing with construction works and delivery, installation and commissioning of equipment. This allows us to say with confidence that Rosatom effectively fulfills all of its obligations assumed and guarantees safety and reliability of its technology for the well-being of future generations,” said Alexey Deriy, Vice President for Bangladesh Projects at AtomStroyExport.
Other news from the site
On September 2, employees’ children held a ceremonial line-up in honor of the Day of Knowledge. Ruslan Masagutov, ASE Director in Bangladesh, congratulated the children on this important event. Then a teleconference was held and children from Egypt and Hungary, where Rosatom is also building nuclear stations, joined it online. Children and adults exchanged congratulations and performed poems, songs and even theatrical sketches.
Student construction teams from Rosatom’s backbone universities made their contribution to the Rooppur NPP project. They spent two summer months doing construction and installation works, cataloging and keeping records of design and engineering documents, and inspecting incoming equipment and materials delivered to the site.
The same teams worked at two of Rosatom’s other construction sites abroad, El Dabaa in Egypt and Kudankulam in India. Over the past 15 years, more than 17,000 students have been involved in nuclear industry projects at 29 construction sites, 22 of which are in Russia and seven abroad (Turkey, Belarus, China, India, Egypt and other countries).
