OREANDA-NEWS. Joint-Stock Company "Novosibirsk Chemical Concentrates Plant" (NCCP) and Nuclear Research and consultancy Group Petten (NRG Petten) signed the contract for the delivery of NCCP's low-enriched fuel assemblies for High Flux Reactor (HFR), Petten, Netherlands for the coming years.

This event signifies entry of State Corporation ROSATOM to the foreign research fuel market, which is new for Russia, and will enable Fuel Company TVEL (TVEL) to participate in the international bids for supply of low-enriched plate-type fuel for research reactors of the Western design.

The foundation for cooperation with the Dutch nuclear community was laid in 2006 by the meeting between NCCP's and NRG's representatives at the International Conference "Research Reactor Fuel Management" (RRFM). These initial contacts led in 2007 to the signing of a Memorandum, which envisaged qualification of NCCP as manufacturer of low-enriched uranium-silicide fuel for HFR.

In 2009, with the concurrence of TVEL, NCCP signed the contract for the fabrication and delivery of experimental fuel assemblies (FA) intended for the in-pile test in HFR. In 2011, two experimental FAs were delivered to the customer for a two years' in-pile qualification test. In September 2013, when both FAs reached the specified burn-up, they were discharged from the reactor on schedule. The test results confirmed comparability of the technical characteristics of NCCP's experimental FAs with the reference fuel.

The outcome of the fuel qualification was shared with the international nuclear community on the RERTR (Reduced Enrichment for Research and Test Reactors) 2014 conference at the IAEA in Vienna, in October 2014.

The successful completion of the qualification programme qualifies NCCP as a fabricator of low-enriched fuel for European research reactor of the Western design.