The main contractor’s first advance payment for the $1.2bn contract to build the turbine island for Egypt’s El-Debaa nuclear power plant is expected to be cleared this week, paving the way for construction work to start, according to an industry source.

In the meantime, the sub-contractor, South Korea’s Doosan Enerbility, will continue documentation work and the mobilisation of teams for the project.

Doosan signed the $1.2bn contract with state-owned South Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power (KHNP), a subsidiary of Korea Electric Power Corporation (Kepco), for the project in November last year.

MEED reported at the time that the main construction works on the first tower on the turbine island were expected to commence in the third quarter of 2023.  

The package is a sub-contract for the $2.2bn package that KHNP signed in August for the project after emerging as the sole bidder for the main and auxiliary buildings and structures of the turbine islands for the units, to be built between 2023-29.

The scope of the Doosan Enerbility contract entails the construction of 82 buildings and structures, covering the turbine building, and water treatment and air conditioning systems. It includes installing the turbines and generators.

The contract marked the first time that Doosan Enerbility had won a contract for the construction of an overseas nuclear power plant, in addition to its role of supplying the main equipment, such as the reactors and steam generators.

In January last year, KHNP was approved as the single supplier for the construction of the turbine islands by Russia’s State Atomic Energy Corporation (Rosatom) subsidiary ASE, the project’s main contractor.

Egypt’s Nuclear Power Plants Authority (NPPA) submitted the licensing documentation for the plant’s first two units in June 2021 to the Egyptian Nuclear & Radiological Regulation Authority (ENRRA).

Rosatom obtained a licence to start building the plant’s first reactor in June 2022. The first reactor at the plant is scheduled to be operational in 2026.

In January last year, the NPPA also applied for a construction permit for units 3 and 4 of the El-Dabaa nuclear power plant.

The facility, located in the Matrouh province on Egypt’s Mediterranean coast, will have four units, each with a capacity to generate 1,200MW.

Egypt and Russia signed the initial inter-governmental agreement for the North African state’s first nuclear facility in November 2015.