Krško Nuclear Power Plant
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The Krško Nuclear Power Plant is located in Krško, Slovenia. The plant was connected to the power grid on October 2, 1981 and went into commercial operation on January 15, 1983. It was built as a joint venture by Slovenia and Croatia which were at the time both part of Yugoslavia.
The plant has a Westinghouse pressurized water reactor, with a rated thermal capacity of 1,882 thermal megawatts (MWth) and 632 megawatts-electric (MWe). It runs on enriched uranium (2,1-4,3 weight-percent 235U), fuel mass 48,7 t, with 121 fuel elements, demineralized water as the moderator, and 33 bundles of 20 control rods each made of silver, indium and cadmium alloys to regulate power.
The operating company Nuklearna Elektrarna Krško (NEK) is co-owned by the Slovenian company Gen-Energija, a daughter company of the state-owned Elektro-Slovenija, and the Croatian state-owned company Hrvatska elektroprivreda. The power plant provides more than one-quarter of Slovenia's and roughly a fifth of Croatia's power.
The nuclear waste from the plant is currently being stored nearby. The retirement site near Krško will be filled to capacity by 2011, by which time additional sites will need to be set up. Croatia also has a contractual obligation to take in one half of the nuclear waste by 2025.
The planned retirement date is January 14, 2023. The decommissioning plan that was ratified by Slovenian and Croatian parliaments schedules the start of dissassembly shortly after that, and the taking apart of the plant would last until 2036.
