Nuclear engineering and technology transfer: the Spanish strategies to deal with US, French and German nuclear manufacturers, 1955–1985

We analysed the process of construction and connection to the electrical grid of four Spanish nuclear power plants with different financial and technological foreign partners: those of Zorita (PWR by Westinghouse), Garoña (BWR by General Electric) and Vandellós I (GCR by EDF) (belonging to the first generation of atomic plants and producing electricity from 1969–72) and that of Trillo I (PWR by KWU, connected in 1988). These four examples allow us to observe how the learning curve of nuclear engineering and the acquisition of skills by Spanish companies evolved. Progressively the domestic industry achieved higher levels of participation, fostered by the Ministry of Industry and Energy. When the atomic plants under construction were paralysed by the nuclear moratorium of 1984, and several other projects were abandoned by the utilities along the way, Spain had developed an industrial sector around the fabrication of service components and engineering for nuclear power plants to compete internationally. ; The authors wish to acknowledge the financial support of the Spanish Government through research grants HAR2014-53825-R and HAR2017-86086-R. Additionally, Rubio-Varas and De la Torre received funding from the Euratom research and training programme 2014–2018 under grant agreement N°662268.