Davis reported on mid-April 2024 that SMR component manufacturer BWX Technologies (BWXT) will invest $80 million in equipment and expansions in Cambridge and Kitchener that are expected to create more than 200 jobs.
Ontario Energy Minister Todd Smith speaks during an announcement at BWXT
in Cambridge. The company is investing $80 million in an expansion and new
equipment. Courtesy BWXT
The 55,000-square-foot expansion at the Coronation Boulevard facility in Cambridge will grow that location to 280,000 square feet, while the company’s Projects and Field Services business will move to a 150,000-square-foot facility in Kitchener.
“We’re making these investments because we see increasing demand for our products and services,” BWXT’s president of commercial operations, John MacQuarrie, said as the project was announced Friday.
MacQuarrie said the Cambridge site is already one of North America’s largest nuclear component manufacturing plants. The expansion — expected to be completed in the second half of 2026 — will boost capacity to support current and future demand for components destined for small modular reactors and traditional large-scale nuclear and advanced reactors, a release said.
BWXT’s components are used worldwide; in Ontario, the company’s clients include Bruce Power and Ontario Power Generation (OPG). MacQuarrie said that about 80 per cent of the “marquee product” produced in Cambridge by BWXT, nuclear steam generators, have gone to Bruce Power and OPG; BWXT has made more than 340 of the generators at the Cambridge facility so far.
One contract for Bruce Power worth about $1 billion was signed a few years ago and will run through 2033, noted Bruce Power’s president and chief executive officer, Mike Rencheck.
The Kincardine-area nuclear power station is also looking to add 4,800 megawatts of additional nuclear capacity. Major OPG refurbishment and new nuclear projects also rely on BWXT products.
“What makes a company successful, whether it’s OPG or whether it’s Bruce Power, is having great partners. No individual company can be successful — it is the people around us that lead to that — and we’re very, very proud to call BWXT one of our partners,” OPG president and chief executive officer Ken Hartwick said.
“Canada is a world leader when it comes to the development of nuclear technology, providing safe, reliable, affordable electricity — non-emissions electricity — on our grid,” Ontario Energy Minister Todd Smith said at Friday’s event.
BWXT’s investment includes $30 million for advanced manufacturing equipment “that will further increase our capacity, improve our productivity and make us more competitive globally,” MacQuarrie said.
BWXT is headquartered in Virginia, and employs about 7,800 people in the United States, Canada and the U.K. MacQuarrie said about half of the company’s 1,600 Canadian employees work in Cambridge.
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