KEPCO Nuclear Fuel (NF) Co. President Kim Ki-hak is the winner of the Order of Industrial Service, Iron Tower at the 38th Korea National Quality Award Convention that took place at COEX in southern Seoul on Nov. 21. He is committed to achieving its task of building confidence by establishing quality management system. Hosted and organized by the Korean Agency for Technology and Standards (KATS), under the umbrella of the Ministry of Knowledge Economy (MKE) and the Korean Standardization Association (KSA), the convention is an annual event since 1975 to award prizes to corporations or those who contributed to quality management and product innovation in a bid to awaken the significance of quality management and publicize it.

KEPCO NF President Kim has held positions with KEPCO, KEPCO NF and other public enterprises for 43 years in which he has devoted himself to ensuring a stable supply of electricity by attaching priority to quality and providing for a rainy day under the catchphrase “where there’s a will there’s a way.” In particular, taking the helm at KEPCO NF, Kim has been credited with his contribution to striking deals to export 400 billion won worth of nuclear fuel as well as saving $104 million in costs by developing nuclear reactor software on its own and reducing by 24 billion won in fuel cycle cost by developing homegrown nuclear fuel. 

Celebrating the 30th anniversary this year, KEPCO NF has built a platform for making another leap forward as the company has launched such megaprojects as the third nuclear fuel plant project, the second tube plant project and a project to localize a steam generator tube. The company has been endeavoring to ensure there are no accidents, no faulted products and no-worksite disasters as it established the production innovation system, dubbed KIPS, designed to ensure the safety of nuclear power and sustainable growth engines. KEPCO NF is ramping up quality management activities to reduce nuclear fuel losses to less than 10 percent of those of global players. 

AMICABLE LABOR-MANAGEMENT TIES AND SHARED GROWTH WITH COOPERATIVE FIRMS Management and labor at KEPCO NF have declared top four principles to promote collaboration for better working conditions and achieving their common values and have made efforts to solve the pending issues in a rational fashion under the cause of the “Great Promise,” signed by management and labor. Acknowledging partnerships with its cooperative firms, the company has been providing support to the development of technology and the exploration of markets while expanding shared growth and profit paradigms by preferring to purchasing products from SMEs. The company is also committed to its tasks as a public enterprise of promoting collaboration with industry, campus and research circles, creating jobs for youth and accelerating shared management in the interests of the underprivileged. 

ITS 2ND FOUNDING- KEPCO NF President Kim has declared his company’s second founding as the Korean nuclear fuel maker is now in business for 30 years at a ceremony to launch the 2012 business year in which all KEPCO NF executives and staff members participated. Kim urged them to take a determined stance in the same way as when the nuclear fuel business was launched in the 1980s and to devote themselves to making historic megaprojects successful. They pledged to advance the goal of becoming a global top three nuclear fuel maker by 2020. 

KEPCO NF was established in 1982 as a government-invested organization charged exclusively with developing and manufacturing nuclear fuel in Korea. 

KEPCO NF, with homegrown light water reactor (LWR) and heavy water reactor (HWR) nuclear fuel-manufacturing technology, has developed advanced nuclear fuel, PLUS7 and ACE7. The company now supplies nuclear fuel to 19 LWR nuclear plants in Korea and four HWRs, which have a combined share of about 40 percent in the nation's total electricity generation. 

Besides producing nuclear fuels using dry conversion (DC) processes, the company is developing proprietary next-generation, high-performance nuclear fuel as well as designing reactor cores and evaluating safety to assure the safe and economical production of electrical power in nuclear reactors. It is also designing and producing non-fuel reactor core components while producing tubes for nuclear fuel rods.

Aiming to start production in 2012, it is now developing the third generation advanced nuclear fuel with higher performance and improved safety compared to existing nuclear fuels, called HIPER (high performance with efficiency and reliability). Through these processes and experiences, the company has accumulated rich human resources and technological know-how and is ready to transfer them to those countries that are considering introducing nuclear power plants. 

Leveraging these experiences and technologies, KEPCO NF will develop nuclear power and fuels as new growth engines for export. In conjunction with other companies, including KEPCO Corp., the company is actively expanding its overseas markets, and it will supply high performance nuclear fuels to nuclear power plants in the United Arab Emirates, which are under construction by KEPCO.

Replacing conventional AUC processes, KEPCO NF is producing nuclear fuels using dry conversion (DC) processes that cost less during manufacturing. When fuel assembly is completed after going through complicated and meticulous processes, the company conducts thorough inspections and evaluations of its products and supplies to nuclear power plants only those products that are evaluated to be 100 percent perfect.

MOU signed with KRMC on radioactive waste project management

Korea Electric Power Corp. Nuclear Fuel (KEPCO NF) has signed an MOU with Korea Radioactive-waste Management Corp. (KRMC) for joint research and development on radioactive waste. The signing took place between KEPCO NF President Kim Ki-Hak and KRMC President Song Myung-Jae at KEPCO NF’s grand conference room on May 7, 2012. 

Under the MOU, both sides have pledged to:

¶UWork to facilitate exchange of technical data and information on radioactive waste management

¶UConduct joint research on radioactive waste management skills

¶UInitiate technical cooperation for launch of new business and exploration of overseas markets.

¶UInitiate cooperation on mutual use of facilities and installations. 

KEPCO NF President Kim remarked that “we will be able to promote the efficiency of radioactive waste management projects” through the agreement concluded with KRMC. He hoped that both sides will work jointly to promote industrial development and explore overseas markets by utilizing a joint technical cooperation system.