The first reactor unit of Fangchenggang nuclear power station in autonomous region of Guangxi  was recently integrated into the Grid. Stainless steel plates used in the reactor internal, the core of this unit, are fully supplied by TISCO, who had supplied such material to another two 1,000 MW nuclear reactor units before, i.e. No.2 unit of Jiyang River nuclear power station and No.4 Hongyan River unit.

 

Reactor internal is made from pure austenitic stainless steel material, has the highest safety class, works as the heart of a power station, and is the key part for safe operation of a station. The special material for reactor internal used to be imported from overseas market for a long time before TISCO made success in the R&D of the material. Lifetime requirement for the reactor internal, which works under irradiation of heavy-dose neutron, flush of high temperature coolant and strong vibration, is 60 years, the same as that of nuclear power station. Therefore, it requires extreme high quality of the stainless steel material. TISCO started the R&D of nuclear grade stainless steel in 2007, since when the company has overcome a series of technical difficulties in terms of cleanness, width limit, thickness limit, structure control, and etc., and finally worked out a complete set of production processes covering the full specification and realized stable quality. It took merely 6 months for TISCO from organizing production to finishing delivery of the stainless steel plates for No.1 and No.2 Fangchenggang units. Data shows that the nuclear grade stainless steel plate supplied by TISCO has the same as or even superior quality than foreign counterpart products.

 

Since the Ling-Ao Nuclear Power Project Phase II, TISCO supplied nuclear grade stainless steel material has covered almost all nuclear power projects under operation or construction. Such material has been widely used in reactor internals, accumulators and pressure vessels. The company, who has successfully developed the third generation nuclear grade stainless steel, including CAP1000, CAP1400, and Hua-long No.1, is the predominant supplier in China for nuclear grade stainless steel, as well as the only steel producer in China who is capable of supplying nuclear grade stainless steel plate for reactor internal.