News from the Hungarian Nuclear Society

Two major events have significantly impacted upon the Hungarian nuclear community

Two recent events have had a significant effect upon the nuclear community in Hungary. The first event is the Annual General Assembly of the Hungarian Nuclear Society (HNS), which took place at the end of May 2012. This is the most important event that the Society organizes each year and its main objective is to approve the Activity Report of the previous year (2011), as well as the annual budget of the following year (2012). In addition, at this year’s Annual General Meeting the President of the Society for the period 2013-15 was elected. The new Presidency was organised by the Society’s current President and Secretary, as well as by 10 members. At the same time a new Supervisory Board was also elected. The new President will take over his position and carry out his duties as of January 1, 2013. Information introducing the Society’s new officers will be communicated in ENS NEWS early next year.

The second event is the setting up of a new company within the MVM Hungarian Power Companies Ltd., called MVM Paks II NPP Development Ltd. The mission of the new company is to carry out preparatory work on two new units at the Paks NPP site, which will prove a total capacity of 2-3000 MWe. The new units will be operational as of 2020. The call for proposal (i.e. the tender document) is to be issued before the end of the year. The potential site locations for the new units are illustrated on the diagram below.

In addition, a top-level Governmental Committee on Nuclear Energy has been set up to coordinate strategic decisions related to all NPP development activity in Hungary. The Committee is headed by the Prime Minister and the two ministers responsible for the economy and development are also members of it. The aforementioned activities show that Hungarian decision-makers consider the use of nuclear energy for long-term energy production is essential for Hungary.