Strategy of plant concept development in Hitachi

Hitachi contributes to the society in various fields of nuclear power such as the Light Water Reactor field, the Fast Breeder Reactor, the fuel cycle, and the medical treatment. Since the beginning of a first commercial operation of a BWR in Japan, Hitachi has constructed 20 units of BWR. Hitachi continues its efforts in achieving high reliability and large-scale output, and in 1996, it completed Advanced Boiling Water Reactor (ABWR) in cooperation with various BWR utilities, General Electric Company, and Toshiba Corporation. Hitachi has enhanced the ABWR technology further based on the above enough experience. The latest technologies were reflected in Hamaoka unit 5 and Shika unit 2 as the latest ABWR plants. The further upgrade technologies would been reflected in Shimane-3, Ohma-1 and Higashidori-1 as ABWR plants under planning. Hitachi obtains the chance to construct the nuclear power plant continuously. For the next generation, Hitachi is working on developing nuclear power plants that take diversified needs and global characteristics into account. As one of the approaches, the output series formation of BWR is extended as the following. ABWR-II and ESBWR (Economic and Simplified BWR) as a large-scale centralized power supply emphasizing cost efficiency, Medium size ABWR and natural circulation type BWR as medium and small-scale distributed power supply that features flexibility to various market needs, such as minimized capital risks, timely return on a capital investment, etc. As another approach, Hitachi tries to extend the Light Water Reactor technology. RBWR (Resource-Renewable BWR ) that achieves a high conversion ratio over 1.0 based on the BWR technology will make the fuel cycle flexible. Hitachi will continue the challenge for the next ABWR and the future with the enough experience of BWR construction. (author)