The Czech state-owned power utility ČEZ has selected two preferred locations for small modular reactors (SMR) in Czechia. After selected the Temelín nuclear power plant site to build the country’s first SMR, the company now plans to deploy units in Dětmarovice and Tušimice, where are currently located coal-fired power plants (600 MW at Dětmarovice and 800 MW at Tušimice). The two sites will go through a whole series of other intensive survey and monitoring works before it becomes definitively clear whether they are suitable for the location of a nuclear project.
As part of its Vision 2030, ČEZ committed to prepare the construction of small modular reactors with a total output of over 1,000 MW after 2040. However, SMRs could be built in the mentioned locations as early as the second half of the 1930s. ČEZ has already signed memoranda of cooperation in the field of SMRs with NuScale, GE Hitachi, Rolls Royce, EdF, Westinghouse, KHNP and Holtec.
In January 2022, Czechia committed to phase out coal in power generation by 2033. Coal and lignite account for 41% of the country’s capacity, with 8.9 GW at end-2021, followed by nuclear (20%, 4.3 GW).