Workers have begun assembling the dry shield block (a steel cylindrical structure filled with heat-resistant serpentinite concrete), which will surround the VVER-1200 reactor core at power unit No. 3 of Leningrad NPP-2. This was reported by the press service of Rosatom State Corporation.
Fitters and builders assembled and concreted the lower block, resulting in a structure with a diameter of more than 6 meters and a height of more than 2 meters. Together with the upper block, the height of the dry shield will be almost 7.5 meters.
Evgeny Milushkin, Head of the Capital Construction Department of Leningrad NPP-2, said that the 130-ton dry shield will be installed inside the reactor building. This operation will be performed in the second quarter of 2026.
Then the installation of the last element of the core catcher — the lower plate — will begin.
The remaining parts of the "core catcher" (a steel cone-shaped container under the reactor) were installed at the end of 2025, he summarized.
Construction work at the site where power unit No. 3 is being built began in 2022. The general contractor is the Titan-2 holding.