Rolls-Royce wins contract to build small nuclear reactors for Sweden
UK firm’s SMR unit beats competition from GE Vernova Hitachi for its third major contract
Rolls-Royce will build small nuclear power plants for Sweden in a major boost for the British engineering group’s ambitions to lead the development of the nascent technology in Europe.
A group led by Rolls-Royce will build three mini reactors for the Scandinavian nation after beating competition from GE Vernova Hitachi. It is the third major contract for Rolls-Royce SMR unit, whose backers include CEZ, the Czech utility, and Qatar Investment Authority.
The latest win for Rolls-Royce SMR follows successful tenders in the UK and the Czech Republic as governments are backing small modular reactors to provide a reliable source of electricity to meet rising demand without carbon emissions.
Proponents of the SMRs, which are smaller than the conventional gigawatt-scale plants, say they can be built with fewer delays due to modular construction methods — where they are constructed in a factory and then transported to the final site for assembly — and avoid cost overruns. But critics say there is no certainty this will materialise.
The International Energy Agency has estimated that more than 1,000 SMRs could be built around the world by 2050, with cumulative investment of more than $670bn in the sector.
Under the deal announced on Monday, Rolls-Royce SMR will deliver three reactors, each designed to deliver 470 megawatts of electricity, next door to the existing Ringhals nuclear plant on Sweden’s west coast.
Peter Kyle, UK business secretary, said the award was a “major vote of confidence in British innovation and our nuclear industry — we are now at the heart of the European nuclear renaissance alongside our partners in Sweden”.
The so-called Videberg project will strengthen Sweden’s energy system by adding 1,500MWe of capacity — about 6 per cent of the country’s annual power consumption — for more than 60 years.
Anna Borg, chief executive of Sweden’s state-owned utility Vattenfall and a board member of Videberg Kraft, the nuclear power company owned by Vattenfall and Industrikraft, said Rolls-Royce was chosen over GE Vernova Hitachi partly to reduce the risk of geopolitical disruption.
GE Vernova Hitachi is an alliance between the US-based GE Vernova and Japan’s Hitachi.
The reactors will probably be built in the UK and the Czech Republic and then be assembled on site in Sweden, according to one person familiar with the project.
The first unit is expected to start operating in the mid-2030s.
Sweden’s centre-right government has revived the nuclear industry after previous governments closed down several reactors dating from the 1970s and 1980s after several accidents.
A parliamentary election in September will probably lead to a change of government led by the centre-left Social Democrats, according to opinion polls, and its potential coalition partners are more sceptical of nuclear power than the parties that form the current government.