Framatome and EDF Renew Long-Term Operations and Maintenance Service Agreement for Sizewell B Nuclear Power Station, Safeguarding the UK's Only PWR Unit's Life Extension into the 2040s

Framatome of France and Électricité de France (EDF) have recently formally renewed a 15-year Long-Term Service Agreement (LTSA). The agreement will comprehensively cover integrated routine operations and maintenance as well as refueling outage services for Sizewell B Nuclear Power Station (Sizewell B NPP) in Suffolk, UK, to support the unit's ongoing long-term operation and life extension development strategy.

Framatome has been continuously responsible for core overhaul and technical maintenance work at Sizewell B since 2008. The renewed long-term service contract extends directly to 2040. Framatome will mobilize its global technical expertise in the pressurized water reactor (PWR) field and its UK professional team, coordinating technical resources from France, Germany, and the United States, to comprehensively manage reactor pressure vessel and steam generator maintenance, main coolant pump and valve overhauls, non-destructive testing (NDT), outage supply chain coordination, and on-site outage engineering personnel deployment, ensuring the unit maintains excellent baseload power generation efficiency under extremely high nuclear safety standards.

John Munro, Managing Director of Nuclear Operations at EDF UK, stated that the extension of this long-term service contract is built on decades of mutual trust between the two parties. During the UK's transition period toward advancing new-build EPR Generation III nuclear projects such as Hinkley Point C and Sizewell C, ensuring the safe and stable operation of Sizewell B is of strategic cornerstone significance for the UK to achieve its net-zero emissions target. Guirec Maugat, Executive Vice President of Framatome's Installed Base Business, also noted that the company will deepen the cultivation of local UK technical talent and build a high-caliber outage expert team to continuously serve the UK's nuclear power units.

Sizewell B is currently the UK's only commercial pressurized water reactor nuclear power unit in operation, with an installed capacity of 1,198 megawatts (MW). It was commissioned in 1995 with an original 40-year operating life extending to 2035. After the UK government and operator EDF reached an agreement in principle in July this year on a 20-year life extension financing plan, EDF is expected to invest £800 million (approximately US$1 billion) to carry out systematic refurbishment and upgrades of the unit during each planned outage window over the next 15 years, including the deployment of new environmental monitoring systems, fully automated plant monitoring systems, and the replacement of core piping, pumps, valves, and other rotating and static equipment throughout the plant.

Since connecting to the grid for commercial operation, Sizewell B Nuclear Power Station has cumulatively delivered more than 270 terawatt-hours (TWh) of clean electricity to the UK grid, equivalent to meeting the electricity needs of all households in Suffolk and Norfolk for over a century; the station provides approximately 900 high-quality full-time jobs year-round and is a core clean energy hub on the UK's eastern coast.