Cernavoda Unit 1 has been resynchronized / The plant is gradually returning to nominal output

Unit 1 of the Cernavoda nuclear power plant was resynchronized with the National Energy System on Sunday at 1:00 a.m., after a technical fault was repaired. The plant is expected to reach nominal output on Sunday morning at 7:00 a.m., through a gradual increase in production. The restart took place earlier than the estimate previously published by Transelectrica, according to which synchronization was scheduled for 9:00 a.m.

At the time of writing, the plant was producing nearly 1,000 MW. Unit 1 had been shut down in a controlled manner and disconnected on July 28 due to the low flow of the Danube. Subsequently, in mid-August, Unit 2 was also shut down, with the two reactors accounting for approximately 20% of Romania’s dispatchable electricity.

Unit 1 had previously been resynchronized on Friday afternoon, but was disconnected again on Monday evening following a failure of equipment in the conventional part of the facility, subsequently identified in the turbine condenser. The incident had no impact on nuclear safety.

Nuclearelectrica announced that, starting December 1, 2026, the technical director of Cernavoda NPP will be replaced. The root cause of the failure will be analyzed in a subsequent report.