Standardization of advanced light water reactors and progress on achieving utility requirements

This paper reports that for a number of years, the U.S. utilities had led an industry-wide effort to establish a technical foundation for the design of the next generation of light water reactors in the United States. Since 1985, this utility initiative has been effected through a major technical program managed by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI); the U.S. Advanced Light Water Reactor (ALWR) Program. In addition to the U.S. utility leadership and sponsorship, the ALWR Program also has the participation and sponsorship of a number of international utility companies and close cooperation with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). The NPOC Strategic Plan for Building New Nuclear Plants creates a framework within which new standardized nuclear plants may be built. The Strategic Plan is an expression of the nuclear energy industry's serious intent to create the necessary conditions for new plant construction and operation. The industry has assembled a comprehensive, integrated list of actions that must be taken before new plants will be built and assigns responsibility for managing the various issues and sets time-tables and milestones against which we must measure progress