South Korea's Gaon Cable to Build Nuclear Power Plant Dedicated Cable Production Line in the United States

South Korean LS Group's cable manufacturing subsidiary Gaon Cable (Korean: 가온전선, English: Gaon Cable Co., Ltd.) announced on Monday that it will build a nuclear power plant dedicated cable production line at its production base in North Carolina, United States, to seize the incremental market opportunities brought by the U.S. nuclear power expansion.

Gaon Cable revealed that its U.S. subsidiary LS Cable & System U.S.A. will add related production equipment at its Tarboro, North Carolina factory. This strategic move aims to establish a localized supply system to respond to the upcoming expansion of supporting cable demand in the United States for large commercial nuclear power plants as well as Small Modular Reactors (SMR).

Currently, the factory is already producing overhead transmission lines for the U.S. domestic power grid. After adding nuclear-grade cable production lines, it will further broaden its locally manufactured product portfolio.

Gaon Cable pointed out that because the number of newly built nuclear reactors in the United States over the past decades has been limited, the equipment supply chain foundation, including nuclear power cables, is relatively weak. As AI data centers cause sharp growth in electricity load, combined with the rising strategic weight of energy security, attention to building new nuclear reactors has significantly increased.

Depending on the specific design of the nuclear power unit, a nuclear power plant may have more than 50,000 cable circuits used for power transmission, process control, and instrumentation monitoring. Because each cable must meet differentiated and strict technical specifications according to the specific laying environment and operating conditions, nuclear-grade cables typically exhibit production characteristics of many varieties and small-batch customization.

LS Cable & System U.S.A. plans to rely on Gaon Cable's special cable manufacturing technology to obtain relevant industry qualification certifications, and to jointly enter the U.S. local supply chain together with South Korean nuclear-related industry chain enterprises.

Industry analysis believes that with the construction of large nuclear power units and the deployment of small modular reactors, procurement demand for nuclear power cables will continue to rise; at the same time, existing in-service nuclear power units will also generate substantial stock renewal demand for replacing aging cables during life extension operations.

A relevant person in charge at Gaon Cable stated that as the scale of the U.S. nuclear energy industry gradually expands and South Korean enterprises deepen their participation in U.S. nuclear power projects, localized equipment suppliers will usher in new market growth opportunities.