25 February, 2011 - URS Corporation has been awarded a contract by Areva to provide procurement, construction and management services for the planned Eagle Rock Enrichment Facility in Idaho.
URS - a provider of engineering, construction and technical services - said that under the terms of the contract, signed with Areva Enrichment Services LLC, it will perform its work in two phases. The value of the contract was not disclosed.
A COL application is currently with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) which Areva hopes will allow it to begin construction later this year. AES submitted its licence application for the plant at the end of 2008. However, in March 2009 the company informed the NRC that it intended to revise the application to double the capacity of the plant from the originally planned 3.3 million SWU (separative work units, the unit of measurement for uranium enrichment) to 6.6 million SWU per year.
The Eagle Rock uranium enrichment facility is expected to begin operating in 2014 and to be fully constructed by 2017. The plant will be similar to a new Areva's Georges Besse II facility at Tricastin, France, which is based on centrifuge technology licensed from Urenco.
In May 2010, Areva was awarded a conditional offer of a loan guarantee for $2 billion. The loan guarantee supports a large part of the total cost of the project and should help Areva raise private capital. The Department of Energy put the cost of Eagle Rock at $3.3 billion.
source: http://www.yourindustrynews.com
