An agreement in principle to form a new joint venture to develop, market and construct the Advanced Fuel Candu Reactor (*AFCR) has been signed by Canada’s SNC-Lavalin, China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC) and Shanghai Electric.
The agreement follows the signing of a framework agreement in November 2014 between CNNC and SNC-Lavalin’s Candu Energy. The main purpose of this agreement is the construction of a reactor that will burn used fuel from PWR.
The joint venture company is expected to be registered in mid-2017. This would be followed by the formation of two design centres – one in Canada and the other in China – to complete the AFCR technology. SNC-Lavalin said this could lead to the construction of the world’s first two ACFR units in China and “possible subsequent builds in China and around the world”.
* AFCR is described as “a 700 MW Class Generation III reactor based on the highly successful Candu 6 and Enhanced Candu 6 (EC6) reactors with a number of adaptations to meet the latest Canadian and international standards.” The reactor features a heavy-water moderator and heavy-water coolant in a pressure tube design and can use both recycled uranium and thorium as fuel.
