American company Westinghouse gives Ukraine permit for nuclear fuel technology
The Minister of the Energy and Coal Industry Ihor Nasalyk during a Q and A with the government stated that Ukraine received permission from the American company Westinghouse to use their technologies for producing nuclear fuel in Ukrainian nuclear plants.
Currently, the technology used to produce fuel for PWR-type reactors, which Ukrainian nuclear power plants are equipped with, are exclusively owned by Westinghouse and the Russian company TVEL.
According to the minister, a fuel plant can be built in three years. “That means that only the enrichment of uranium will have to be done outside of Ukraine since we cannot do it after we lost our status as a nuclear country,” Nasalyk added.
The Ukrainian government concluded an agreement with Westinghouse on supplies of nuclear fuel for Ukrainian nuclear power plants, but until now it has not been possible to switch to American fuel completely since most of the plants are working on Russian fuel assemblies.