KWN, a company jointly owned by Westinghouse Electric Company and KEPCO Nuclear Fuel, has begun production of control element assemblies (CEAs) for Combustion Engineering-designed nuclear plant customers worldwide. The first order of 56 CEAs will be delivered in February 2012 to the Yonggwang Nuclear Power Plant, Unit 5, Korea.
Control element assemblies are a key component of the system that controls the nuclear reaction in a reactor. Westinghouse and KEPCO Nuclear Fuel formed KW Nuclear Components Co., Ltd. (KWN) in 2008 to fabricate the CEAs.
The start of manufacturing at KWN marks the completion of a significant effort to develop the production facility, which was completed in April 2011. This effort included training KWN employees at the Westinghouse Windsor Fuel Components Facility (Windsor, Connecticut-USA), developing the facility's quality assurance program, and implementing state-of-the-art manufacturing processes and procedures.
Westinghouse acquired Asea Brown Boveri's (ABB) nuclear businesses, which included Combustion Engineering, in 2000.
KEPCO Nuclear Fuel has been supplying nuclear fuel and related services to all nuclear power plants in Korea, which is comprised of 17 Pressurized Water Reactors (PWRs) and four CANada Deuterium Uranium reactors (CANDUs).