The International Advisory Board to determine the research program for the world’s most powerful multi-purpose fast neutron research reactor (MBIR) under construction in Russia is planned to be established in 2022, as Konstantin Vergazov, CEO of Consortium Leader of MBIR Reactor International Research Centre, a Rosatom’s company, announced to reporters.
“We have now an important issue on the project agenda — the program of international research at the MBIR reactor,” Vergazov told reporters on the margins of the Congress of Young Scientists in Sochi. At the Congress, round-table discussions dedicated to the progress of the MBIR project were held.
“This work has been completed. This year, we approved the national program for advanced experimental research at MBIR for 2028–2040 as the basis for discussing an international program which will engage our international partners,” Vergazov added.
Vergazov further noted that the Russian program has been developed in cooperation with researchers from Rosatom, Kurchatov Institute, the Russian Academy of Sciences, and Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (Dubna).
K. Vergazov: “For the next year, we are planning to create the International Advisory Board, and by the end of 2022, to get down straight to discussing the international research program.”
According to Vergazov, the Board will include leading Russian and international experts. He explained that the Board and its technical committees targeted to various fields would be vested with all the powers required to manage the research side of the MBIR project.
As for the access of Russian and foreign partners to the new facility, it will be provided via a legal platform that is unique for the Russian market — a consortium named “MBIR Reactor International Research Centre,” Vergazov explained.
The MBIR reactor with a thermal capacity of 150 MW is under construction on the site of Rosatom’s Research Institute of Atomic Reactors (RIAR) in Dimitrovgrad, Ulyanovsk Region. The reactor commissioning is scheduled for the second half of the 2020s.
It is expected that MBIR will provide the nuclear industry with a modern and technologically advanced research infrastructure for half a century ahead. The unique technical characteristics of MBIR will allow solving a wide range of research problems to justify the creation of new competitive and safe nuclear power plants, including fast neutron reactors, nuclear fuel cycle closure while ensuring an enormous enhancement of the opportunities for experimental research.
It is planned to create an international research center powered by MBIR — as the platform for foreign stakeholders to carry out their experiments. Therefore, Russia will vindicate its leadership on the global nuclear science agenda by the end of this century
