South Korea Is ‘Preferred Bidder’ For Jordan Research Reactor

The deal calls for the 5-megawatt reactor to be built at the Jordan University for Sciences and Technology by 2014. The university is in Irbid, a city 70 kilometers to the North of Jordan’s capital, Amman. An official contract is to be signed in March of next year, and the reactor will be used for scientific and engineering studies, and also for producing isotopes for medical and industrial purposes.

The Jordan Atomic Energy Commission (JAEC) chose the South Korean consortium over rival bids from Argentina, China, and Russia.

South Korea has been operating its 30-megawatt High-flux Advanced Neutron Application Reactor (HANARO) since 1995 and has been eyeing export markets in the past few years.

KAERI said the research reactor deal with Jordan is also expected to open the way for the country to make further inroads into the global nuclear power plant market.

In March 2009 talks were held in Jordan about South Korea building Jordan’s first nuclear reactor unit. At the time South Korea said Jordan was “leaning towards a private deal” with South Korea and not issuing a public tender for the construction of the country’s first reactor unit.

Late last month a South Korean consortium won a contract worth up to 40 billion US dollars (about 27 billion euro) to build four 1,400 megawatt nuclear reactor units in the United Arab Emirates.

>>Related reports in the NucNet database (available to subscribers)

‘Framework Agreed’ On Deal For South Korea To Build First Unit In Jordan (World Nuclear Review No. 11, 13 March 2009)

Source: NucNet
Editor: david.dalton@worldnuclear.org