“The units at the Cernavoda plant are rated among the best in Europe and this project is part of an industry-wide upgrade strategy for nuclear plant safety in the event of serious accidents or natural disasters, such as those that occurred at Fukushima in Japan,” said Patrick Lamarre, Executive Vice-President, SNC-Lavalin Group Inc.
Engineering and procurement activities are underway and construction is scheduled to begin immediately, with preparations for the work to be carried out in the next unit outages.
The expected completion date is late 2013, the Canadian company said in a statement.
SNC-Lavalin is one of the leading engineering and construction groups in the world and a major player in the ownership of infrastructure, and in the provision of operations and maintenance services. The group has offices across Canada and in over 40 other countries around the world, and is currently working in some 100 countries.
Cernavoda operates two reactors of 700 megawatts power each and covers around 20% of Romania’s electricity production. The power plant is owned by Nuclearelectrica, which also controls the majority stake in a joint venture in charge with building two new reactors in Cernavoda.