At the shut-down power unit No. 1 of the Leningrad NPP, all fuel assemblies (FAs) from all 1693 fuel channels of the reactor have been unloaded. So one of the important stages of preparation for its decommissioning has been completed – it is impossible to use the unit as an energy source after the nuclear fuel discharge.

The fuel was discharged into special near-reactor ponds after one year of holding in the reactor. Then it will be transferred to the station's discharged nuclear fuel storage. The completion of work on the transfer of the entire volume of nuclear fuel from power unit No. 1 is scheduled for the end of 2023. All work with nuclear fuel is performed in strict accordance with the requirements of federal rules and regulations.

The fuel that has burned up less than half of the design depth will be used in the reactors of the operating unit No. 3 and No. 4 of the Leningrad NPP. According to Vladimir Pereguda, the head of the Leningrad NPP, this approach brings a significant economic effect. “The implementation of the technology for the afterburning of the remaining nuclear fuel will save on the purchase of about 500 fresh fuel assemblies and the same reduction in the volume of spent fuel assemblies that are expensive for further handling,” he said.

Let us recall that power unit No. 1 of the Leningrad NPP was shut down in December 2018 after 45 years of safe operation, after which they began to work on its preparation for the final stage - decommissioning. At this time, the shut-down power unit is also reliably and safely serviced; in addition to regular fuel removal operations, all its systems are being prepared for decommissioning. In general, it takes about 5 years to prepare a power unit for decommissioning.

In November 2020, also after 45 years of successful operation, unit No. 2 of RBMK-1000 of the Leningrad NPP was also shut down for subsequent decommissioning. Similar to power unit No.1, scheduled operations are carried out on it.

Interestingly, by the time both power units were shut down, two new PWR-1200 generation 3+ units of increased power had been put into operation. Thus, the generation change scheme was ideally implemented at the Leningrad NPP, and the replacement of retired capacities for electricity consumers took place almost unnoticed.

In comparison with RBMK power units, the new PWR-1200 power units have a number of advantages: they are 20% more powerful, and the service life of their irreplaceable equipment is doubled and is 60 years.

The Leningrad NPP is a branch of Rosenergoatom and the largest electricity producer in the North-West Federal District of Russia. In the last few years the share of the Leningrad NPP in ensuring the energy consumption of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region has been more than 56%.