The European Utility Requirements (EUR) - Status and Near Term Activities

P. Berbey, F. Hedin, L. Vanhoenacker

In 1991 5 major European Utilities participating in the US ALWR program decided to develop together a common specification that would contribute to keep the nuclear option open. The European Utility Requirements (EUR) are addressed to the designers and suppliers of LWR plants in order to allow the development of standards designs that can be build and licensed in several European countries with only minor variations. The EUR organization has kept enlarging; today 16 utilities are members of the EUR organization.

Seven compliance analyses dedicated respectively to the BWR90, EPR, EPP, ABWR, SWR1000, AP1000 and to the AES92 projects have been already published. The revised version of the EPR subset of the EUR volume 3 was finalized in mid 2009.

New LWR projects of potential interest for the EUR utilities are being contemplated. For instance a preliminary assessment of compliance of MHI?s APWR project has been worked out in the first months of 2008. Recently EUR organization has decided to launch coordinated actions with other industry groups and other stakeholders. In particular EUR and ENISS organizations have decided to join their efforts in their relations with the IAEA and WENRA organizations with respect to the LWR Gen3 designs. In addition EUR and CORDEL (Cooperation in Reactor Design Evaluation and Licensing), which is a WNA (World Nuclear Association) working group decided also to coordinate their efforts for the industry benefit, in relation with the MDEP (Multinational Design Evaluation Program) initiative of safety nuclear regulators.

Contacts have been also initiated with ENEN and the WNU in order to develop new courses for young professionals.