The concrete work on the bases of the reactor and turbine buildings of the second power unit of Turkey's first nuclear power plant, Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant, has been completed, the construction company said in a statement Tuesday.
The statement by the Akkuyu Nuclear Inc. said that 2,451 tons of reinforced concrete were laid to provide the best hardening of the reactor building foundation in the second power unit of the power plant.
While the amount of iron in question was equal to one-third of the weight of all metal structures in the Eiffel Tower, the metal carcass was used to keep the reinforced concrete in the designed position.
Some 17,000 cubic meters (600,349 cubic feet) of concrete were poured into the reactor foundation slab that covers an area of 6,864 square meters (73,883 square feet), a height of 2.6 meters (8.5 feet) and a depth of 78 meters.
Within the scope of the work, 3,200 tons of reinforcement were placed in the foundation of the turbine building, and the foundation plate was strengthened with 363 supporting carcasses.
Systems and equipment for energy production are located in the turbine building. This equipment includes the turbine facility, the degasser – a device for purifying the water from gas impurities, the water pump and auxiliary equipment. The thermal energy of the water vapor is converted into rotation energy in the turbine building and then into electrical energy in the generator.
The security of the building is kept as tight as in any nuclear power plant facility. The depth of the concrete slab, which is around 5,814 square meters, varies between minus 12.5 and minus 7.1 meters, and the height of the foundation slab varies between 2 and 5.4 meters.
An intergovernmental agreement between Turkey and Russia was signed in May 2010 for the Akkuyu NPP, which will house four VVER-1200 power units with a total installed capacity of 4,800 megawatts.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin presided over the plant's groundbreaking ceremony held on April 3, 2018, via videoconference.
The first reactor of the plant is planned to go online in 2023.