The Darkhovin Nuclear Power Plant (also known as ''Esteghlal Nuclear Power Plant'') is a planned nuclear

power plant A power station, also referred to as a power plant and sometimes generating station or generating plant, is an industrial facility for the electricity generation, generation of electric power. Power stations are generally connected to an el ...

located about 70 kilometers south of

Ahvaz Ahvaz ( fa, اهواز, Ahvâz ) is a city in the southwest of Iran and the capital of Khuzestan province. Ahvaz's population is about 1,300,000 and its built-up area with the nearby town of Sheybani is home to 1,136,989 inhabitants. It is hom ...

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

at the

Karun The Karun ( fa, کارون, ) is the Iranian river with the highest water flow, and its only navigable river. It is long. It rises in the Zard Kuh mountains of the Bakhtiari district in the Zagros Range, receiving many tributaries, such as t ...

river, as part of the nuclear program of Iran. One reactor is firmly planned. Some other projects on this site were cancelled.

History

Before the

Iranian Revolution The Iranian Revolution ( fa, انقلاب ایران, Enqelâb-e Irân, ), also known as the Islamic Revolution ( fa, انقلاب اسلامی, Enqelâb-e Eslâmī), was a series of events that culminated in the overthrow of the Pahlavi dyna ...

had signed a 2 billion dollar contract with French company

Framatome Framatome () is a French nuclear reactor business. It is owned by Électricité de France (EDF) (75.5%), Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (19.5%), and Assystem (5%). The company first formed in 1958 to license Westinghouse's pressurized water react ...

to build two 910 MW

pressurized water reactor A pressurized water reactor (PWR) is a type of light-water nuclear reactor. PWRs constitute the large majority of the world's nuclear power plants (with notable exceptions being the UK, Japan and Canada). In a PWR, the primary coolant (water) i ...

s, at Darkhovin. After the Revolution,

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

withdrew from the project and the engineering components of the plant were withheld in France. The Iranian components were then used to build the units 5 and 6 of

Gravelines Nuclear Power Station The Gravelines Nuclear Power Station is a nuclear power plant located near the commune of Gravelines in Nord, France, approximately from Dunkerque and Calais. Its cooling water comes from the North Sea. The plant consists of 6 nuclear reacto ...

in France which went online in 1985. Construction of the

power station A power station, also referred to as a power plant and sometimes generating station or generating plant, is an industrial facility for the generation of electric power. Power stations are generally connected to an electrical grid. Many ...

was halted during

Iran–Iraq War The Iran–Iraq War was an armed conflict between Iran and Ba'athist Iraq, Iraq that lasted from September 1980 to August 1988. It began with the Iraqi invasion of Iran and lasted for almost eight years, until the acceptance of United Nations S ...

. In 1992, Iran signed an agreement with China to build two 300 MW reactors at the site, which were to be completed within ten years and would have been similar to

Chashma Nuclear Power Plant The Chashma Nuclear Power Plant (or CHASNUPP), is a large commercial nuclear power plant located in the vicinities of Chashma colony and Kundian in Punjab in Pakistan. Officially known as Chashma Nuclear Power Complex, the nuclear power plan ...

in Pakistan which is built by China. But later on China withdrew from the project under

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

pressure. The project was subsequently taken up by Iran itself, as no other country was ready to cooperate in its construction. Iran started to indigenously design the reactor for Darkhovin Nuclear Power Plant basing the design on IR-40 reactor using heavy water. The Iranian nuclear reactor design has a capacity of 360 MW. The plant was announced in 2008, originally scheduled to come online in 2016, but construction has been delayed. There is currently no public information on how many reactors the

is planned to house. The plant is going to be Iran's first indigenously designed and built nuclear power plant besides the

research reactor Research reactors are nuclear fission-based nuclear reactors that serve primarily as a neutron source. They are also called non-power reactors, in contrast to power reactors that are used for electricity production, heat generation, or marit ...

of IR-40. According to the head of Iran's Atomic Energy agency

Abbas Salehi Seyyed Abbas Salehi ( fa, سید عباس صالحی) is an Iranian scholar, journalist and former Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance from 2017 to 2021. He was vice-minister from 2013 until 2017 which also served as acting Minister of Cultu ...

, Swiss-Swedish conglomerate

ABB ABB Ltd. is a Swedish- Swiss multinational corporation headquartered in Zürich, Switzerland. The company was formed in 1988 when Sweden's Allmänna Svenska Elektriska Aktiebolaget (ASEA) and Switzerland's Brown, Boveri & Cie merged to crea ...

has been retained as a partner/external consultant in this project in recent years but has pulled out because of the

international sanctions International sanctions are political and economic decisions that are part of diplomatic efforts by countries, multilateral or regional organizations against states or organizations either to protect national security interests, or to protect in ...

In fiction

In 1976 novel of Paul Erdman, ''Crash of '79'', Darkhovin Nuclear Power Plant is mentioned to have been completed by

and

Mohammed Reza Pahlavi Muhammad ( ar, مُحَمَّد; 570 – 8 June 632 CE) was an Arab religious, social, and political leader and the founder of Islam. According to Islamic doctrine, he was a prophet divinely inspired to preach and confirm the monoth ...

the then

Shah Shah (; fa, شاه, , ) is a royal title that was historically used by the leading figures of Iranian monarchies.Yarshater, EhsaPersia or Iran, Persian or Farsi, ''Iranian Studies'', vol. XXII no. 1 (1989) It was also used by a variety of ...

of Iran uses the plant with the help from

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

and Switzerland to manufacture a dozen salted bombs.

Reactor data

Plans for the site are not clear

References

External links

Documentary: Nuclear confrontation with Iran
{{Energy in Iran Nuclear power stations in Iran Nuclear program of Iran Nuclear power stations with reactors under construction Nuclear power stations with proposed reactors

History

In fiction

Reactor data

See also

References

External links