According to the statement, fuel loading began on 9 September and was completed on 12 September and is now undergoing a regular inspection by the national nuclear regulator.
Next steps in the commissioning process will include pre-critical tests, first criticality, and physical tests, all subject to regulatory control. Completion is expected in about six weeks.
Slovenske Elektrarne said there are 312 fuel assemblies in the core of the VVER-440 pressurised water reactor at Mochovce-3 and 37 positions for control assemblies.
Mochnovce-3 is expected to enter full commercial operation at the beginning of 2023, earlier reports said.
Operation of the new unit, Slovakia’s fifth, could bring the share of nuclear in the country’s electricity generation to 65%, putting it second behind only France, with 69%.
Slovakia is building two Russia-designed VVER-440 units at Mochovce, about 100 km east of the capital Bratislava. There are already two VVER units – Mochovce-1 and -2 – at the site that began operation in 1998 and 2000. Slovakia’s other nuclear plants are Bohunice-3 and -4, both 446-MW VVER units.
The Mochovce and Bohunice facilities are owned by Slovenske Elektrarne, which is in turn owned by the Slovak government, Italy’s Enel and Czech group EPH. Construction of the third and fourth units at Mochovce began in the late 1980s during the Communist era only for work to be halted in the 1990s and resumed again about a decade ago.
