Doosan to supply key SMR equipment to US NuScale Power

Doosan Enerbility Co., South Korea's major power plant builder, will participate in a nuclear power plant in the US as a key equipment supplier for the first time in its history.

The company, formerly known as Doosan Heavy Industries Co., agreed with NuScale Power on April 25 to supply key materials for small modular reactors (SMRs), or NuScale Power Modules (NPM), to the US nuclear fission technology provider.

The SMR equipment will be shipped to the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS) for its power plant project in the state of Idaho, both companies said in a joint statement.

NuScale plans to begin the construction upon receiving regulatory approval for the project in the first half of 2026 and aims to complete it by 2029.

“NuScale welcomes Doosan Enerbility’s participation as a strategic partner in starting key equipment manufacturing for the first SMR nuclear power plant to be built in the United States,” Nuscale Power CEO John Hopkins said in the statement.

Doosan Enerbility will begin the production of large forged materials used in SMR manufacturing in the second half of this year. It will go into full-scale manufacturing of the SMR main equipment in the second half of 2023.

Neither company provided any further details, including the contract value.

SMRs are regarded as next-generation energy providers due to their lower investment costs and fewer carbon emissions than existing large nuclear power plants.

In a bid to secure a solid stream of SMR equipment orders, Doosan bought a combined $104 million stake in NuScale between 2019 and 2021, together with a group of Korean financial investors.  

The stake purchases provided Doosan Enerbility with the rights to supply equipment and materials, amounting to billions of dollars, Doosan said.

“Doosan Enerbility has continuously solidified its strategic cooperative relationship with NuScale Power and has made full preparations for SMR manufacturing,” said Park Geewon, Chairman and CEO of Doosan Enerbility, in the statement. 

Doosan has already been supplying equipment to advanced pressurized water reactors under construction by NuScale.

Last month, it changed the company name to Doosan Enerbility, combining the words "energy" and "sustainability."

For NPMs, or NuScale's SMRs, a maximum of 12 modules each for 77 megawatts (MW) can be installed per plant, giving the power plant the capacity to produce a total 924 MW in electricity. 

NPM became the only SMR design to be approved by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 2020.

NuScale Power is targeting a wider global market for SMR nuclear power plants, including North America, Europe and Asia.

Write to Ik-Hwan Kim at lovepen@hankyung.com
Yeonhee Kim edited this article.