Cooperation with Toshiba Energy Systems & Solutions Corporation

On March 5, a meeting was held in Tokyo between Mr. E.G. Batyrbekov, Director General of the National Nuclear Center of RK and Mr. Goro Yanase, Director of  Toshiba Energy Systems & Solutions Corporation.

The meeting discussed current cooperation under CORMIT project, emphasizing good progress in second project stage (CORMIT-2). Mr. Yanase expressed his gratitude for efforts made by the NNC RK team providing necessary experiment conditions, recognizing undoubted complexity and labor intensity of the experimental researches.

Project CORMIT is oriented to experimental research into interaction of core melt with different high-temperature protective materials in water-cooled reactor (LWR – Light Water Reactor), which may be covered to concrete basement of under-reactor trap providing confinement of core melt in case of severe accident.

Experimental researches for first stage of CORMIT project were carried out for the period from 2012 to 2016. Total of ten large-scale experiments were performed at out-of-pile facility “Lava-B” and several series of small-scale experiments (total about 70 experiments) to determine temperature of phase transition at melting of preset composition corium prototype and study into prototype corium melt interaction with candidate protective material samples.

Starting from 2018, second stage of the project - CORMIT-2 is underway. For the present time, over ten small-scale experiments were performed, as well as series of calibration experiments at “Lava-B” facility, and one large-scale experiment to study heat-resistant covering for under-reactor trap with simulation of residual heat by induction heat.

Discussing prospects of cooperation with NNC RK, leader of Toshiba Energy Systems & Solutions Corporation noted interest of Japan side in its deepening and expansion. According to Mr. Yanase, current interest covers researches in support of solving an issue of save recovering and further storage of corium from breakdown “Fukushima-1” NPP. Considering competence of NNC RK and capacity of existing experimental base, attractive are new directions of cooperation related to development of small and medium power reactor projects, radioecology issues at areas exposed to technogenic radiation impact, as well as testing equipment elements at KTM tokamak, supplied by Toshiba Energy Systems & Solutions Corporation for creating first international fusion reactor ITER.

Leaders agreed to hold workshops to have more detailed discussion of technical issues in terms of proposed new cooperation directions.