The Argentinian Nuclear Regulatory Authority (ARN) has issued a renewed licence to Nucleoeléctrica Argentina for the operation of the second unit of the Atucha nuclear power plant until 26 May 2026. The Atucha nuclear power plant is located in the city of Lima (Eastern Argentina), 115 km from Buenos Aires, and it’s the third largest nuclear power plant in the country. Designed with a heavy water reactor (HWR), which uses natural uranium as fuel and heavy water as moderator and coolant, just like the Atucha I Nuclear Power Plant, the Atucha 2 has seen several licence extensions and temporal shutdowns for security measures and corrective improvement actions. Nucleoelectrica is preparing to submit a licence renewal application to the ARN to extend by 20 years the operating lifetime of Atucha I (340 MW), while Argentina also plans to build a third unit.
Argentina has three operating commercial power reactors with a total capacity of around 1.8 GW: Atucha I (362 MW), Embalse (683 MW), and Atucha II (745 MW). In 2022, the three units produced about 4% of Argentina’s generated electricity.
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