The objectives of the research programme are to ensure that the authorities have sufficient expertise available in different situations, to develop nuclear safety competences and to perform high-quality scientific research.

The Government of Finland granted Finland’s first nuclear decommissioning licence to VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland Ltd for decommissioning the FiR 1 TRIGA Mark II research reactor. The spent fuel was shipped to the U.S. Geological Survey, which will use the fuel in its own research reactor.

In February 2020, a project was launched at VTT to develop a nuclear district heating plant for the Finnish market. The developed technology is called the Low-Temperature District Heating and Desalination Rector, or LDR.

Finland has two ongoing national research programmes in the nuclear sector: KYT2022 and SAFIR2022. The two research programmes held a joint Interim Seminar in March.

The reactor water level measurement became unreliable during the Fukushima accident. VTT has analyzed the behavior of the measurement system at unit 2.

The work on Kraken started recently and has proceeded to the first validation calculations for operating cycle simulations. Transient simulations will soon follow.

The small modular nuclear power reactors under development represent a new way of thinking about nuclear energy. 

In autumn 2019 VTT launched the multi-year domestic project “dECOmm: Finnish Ecosystem for New International Decommissioning Services” bringing together Finnish expertise that will prove useful in the forthcoming effort to decommission nuclear power plants both in Finland and abroad. 

The objective of the Finnish Research Programme on Nuclear Power Plant Safety 2019-2022 (SAFIR2022) is to ensure that should new matters related to the safe use of nuclear power plants arise, the authorities possess sufficient technical expertise and other competence required for rapidly determining the significance of the matters.

Coordinated public research programmes on nuclear waste management have been active in Finland since 1989.