US company plans to build a small nuclear power plant in the Philippines

WASHINGTON — NuScale Power Corp, an American publicly traded company that designs and markets small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs), unveiled Monday plans to build SMRs worth up to $7.5 billion (S$10 billion) in the Philippines. bottom.

NuScale Power executives conveyed their intentions in a meeting with Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., just before going to see US President Joe Biden at the White House.

Mr Marcos, who are in the capital of the United States on a business trip of five days, He said NuScale’s SMR project is important in addressing the country’s energy shortages, which are causing extended power outages in several states.

“We need everything[to address the energy problem]… and what is this new technology,” Marcos said.

Last September, Marcos met with NuScale Power executives during an official visit to the United States.

The president’s secretary of communications, Cheloy Garafil, said the project was a one-sided partnership between NuScale and its local partner Prime Infrastructure Capital, tycoon Enrique Razon Jr., one of the business leaders accompanying the president on his first official visit to Washington. said to be a proposal.

“There is no specific area[yet]. But they are looking at Luzon,” Garafir told the Inquirer.

Oregon-based NuScale Power said it will soon conduct a survey to identify potential SMR sites in the Philippines.

Clayton Scott, NuScale’s executive vice president of business, assured the Philippine delegation that the company has “a very high level of confidence that our technology will perform as expected.”

Scott said their technology is the product of research done by nuclear scientists and secured approval from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which last January approved the design of the first small nuclear reactor in the United States. It is the first and only one,” he said. A 50 megawatt (MW) advanced light water SMR developed by NuScale Power.

According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), SMRs are a fraction of the size and cost of conventional nuclear power reactors and produce low-carbon electricity with about one-third the generating capacity of conventional nuclear facilities. can.

advocacy

Marcos has been a strong advocate for including nuclear power in the Philippines’ energy mix.

In his first national address last July, Marcos said the time was ripe to consider the country’s policy on nuclear energy, with modern technology safeguarding against possible accidents. I mentioned that

He said that if the Philippines decides to use nuclear energy, the government will follow guidelines set by the IAEA, which has set 19 infrastructure issues to be resolved first by any country embarking on a nuclear energy program. It stipulates

Even at the time of the presidential election, Mr. Marcos was already He urged the government to reconsider the possibility of reviving the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP). It was built during the time of his late father and eponymous president.

The 620 MW power plant in Morong, Bataan was built over nine years starting in 1975 at a cost of US$2.3 billion. The original estimated cost was only US$600 million for him. This is believed to be due to payoffs to some government officials.

However, the BNPP was never fueled due to public fear caused by the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster and accusations of corruption.

Last November, Marcos said he wanted to work with France to develop nuclear energy in the Philippines. European countries have extensive experience in nuclear power generation.

Marcos made the remarks after meeting French President Emmanuel Macron on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit in Bangkok, Thailand.