Russia’s Rosatom State Nuclear Energy Corporation has announced the completion of manufacturing of the first RITM-200 reactor unit for the Leningrad nuclear icebreaker.
This is the 13th nuclear reactor unit from the Rosatom, and 15 more units of the RITM series are in different stages of production at various facilities owned by the government-owned corporation.
The most recent unit of the nuclear reactor was made at the the ZiO-Podolsk plant near Moscow, it was the 11th RITM-200 reactor unit to be made at this facility. The facility has also made the more powerful RITM-400 reactor units in the past.
The completion of the trial assembly was announced by the agency on May 14. Meanwhile, the keel for the Leningrad vessel had been laid down at the shipyard in January 2024.
Each unit of the RITM-200 pressurized water reactor has a thermal capacity of 175 MW, which comes out to 30 MW at the propellers. It is claimed to have a service life of at least 40 years.
RITM-200 is 23 feet (7.3 meter) high and 10.8 feet (3.3 meter) in diameter. According to Rosatom, the unique design allows the equipment to be 1.5 times more compact and significantly more powerful than its predecessors.
RITM-200 is the newest marine reactor unit for the Russian nuclear icebreaker fleet. There are currently a number of Project 22220 nuclear-powered icebreakers in Russia’s fleet. These include the Arktika, Sibir, Ural, the Yakutia.
Chukotka, another nuclear icebreaker is undergoing mooring tests, and the two under construction units, the Leningradand the Stalingrad, are at the Baltic Shipyard. The vessels are 567 feet (173 meters) long, and 111 feet (34 meters) wide, and are designed to break through ice up to 9.8 feet (3 meters) thick. Their speed can go up to 25 miles in clear waters.
Russia is also building a giant nuclear-powered icebreaker which would have two RITM-400 reactor units. The Rossiya will be the first vessel under the proposed Project 10510 class of nuclear-powered icebreakers. Once completed it is supposed to be able to clear ice up to 14 feet (4.3 meters) thick.
The trial assembly is considered the last step in the manufacturing of the reactor unit. In this, all assemblies and elements are assembled in the design position – exactly as in the drawings, down to one thousandth of a millimeter. The conclusion of this step allowed engineers to assess that the reactor unit is ready to be shipped off and installed in the vessel.
Apart from their use on nuclear icebreakers, the RITM-200 reactors will also be used for small modular reactor (SMR) nuclear power plants and floating power units.
The Leningrad nuclear icebreaker will be equipped with two RITM-200 reactor units. While this is the first unit for the vessel, the second RITM-200 reactor destined for Leningrad is currently being prepared for hydraulic testing. In this process, the reactor pressure vessel’s integrity is checked for leaks under high pressure. Following the completion of tests, the second reactor unit will also head for trial assembly.
“This RITM was the 13th of its kind. Our enterprise has already manufactured ten RITM-200 and two more powerful RITM-400 reactor units,” said Anton Lebedev, Head of ZiO-Podolsk. Lebedev also mentioned that the dozens of production secrets and a number of patented solutions were used in the manufacture of reactor units.
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