Today - Fifteen Years of Operation of Dukovany Nuclear Power Plant

Currently, the Dukovany Nuclear Power Plant is the biggest source of the power generating company, CEZ, a.s. It is also the only nuclear power plant operated in the Czech Republic. Although the design solution of the power plant comes from the seventies, it has been modernized and reaches very good results that put it into the first quarter of the world's power plants. But its ambitions aim at higher goal. By means of the "Harmonization" programme, which sets the goals especially for the power plant personnel, it wants to advance among the ten per cent of the best operated nuclear units in the world. A continuous upgrading of the power plant equipment is a part of the Harmonization programme, too. This replacement of equipment will be finished in the next few years. It will make possible to operate the nuclear power plant up to the year 2025 at least. Thus it fulfils the official mission of the power generating company, CEZ, a.s.: To meet the customers' demand for electricity and associated services reliably, for competitive prices, in a way which preserves the environment.

In 1999 the consumption in the Czech Republic was 64.3 milliard kilowatt-hours. The power generating company, CEZ, a.s., supplied 71% out of this amount (45.7 milliard kilowatt-hours), other producers supplied 29% (18.6 milliard kilowatt-hours). The share of the Dukovany Nuclear Power Plant in this generation makes 29%, nearly one third. This share speaks for itself.

Just as the last year was a year of record generation, also in this year, 2000, the nuclear power plant should generate a record amount of electricity, 13 milliard and 500 million kilowatt-hours.

All the four units of the Dukovany Nuclear Power Plant and all the eight turbines, which have received woman's names from the workers of Škoda PlzeĹ? Company in the time of the construction: " MARIE, ALENA, ZDENA, IRENA, DĂ?ŠA, LENKA, GERDA and MARTA", work at full power. From the beginning of the year 2000 until today, the day of the anniversary, the Dukovany Nuclear Power Plant has supplied into the national grid 4 milliard 759 million kilowatt-hours in all.

From the beginning of its operation before 15 years until today the nuclear power plant has generated 174 milliard kilowatt-hours totally. This amount of energy has been acquired without burning fossil fuels and without production of greenhouse gases. Thus nuclear electricity has spared us the burning of 170 million tonnes of coal. It is difficult to imagine this amount, it would be transported by a train about 40 000 km long, circumventing the Earth at the equator, and there will still be some thousands of kilometres left.

Eng. Petr Spilka, Spokesman for the Dukovany Nuclear Power Plant - spilkp1.edu@mail.cez.cz

3. 5. 2000