VINACHEM

Russia has established a new centre for the development and manufacture of high-tech products made from polymer composites.

The Polymer Composites Technical Competence Centre, due to develop products primarily suitable for the oil and gas industry and for civil aircraft and plane engines, was set up by LLC Ural Plant of Gas Centrifuges (UZGTS) in the closed nuclear industry town of Novouralsk, east of the Ural Mountains.

UZGTS is an enterprise of the Scientific-Production Association of Rosatom Fuel Company TVEL, which is involved chiefly in uranium mining and nuclear fuel.

The latest Novouralsk project represents what it called "an innovative new direction in development and manufacture of promising non-nuclear products".

UZGTS director general Andrey Galata said: “Technologies offered by us allow the replacement of the heavy metal in the modern design of polymer composite materials, which are not inferior in strength, and in some cases superior to metal products.

“Polymeric composites are more durable, do not corrode, are light and so much more convenient for installation and more practical to use.”

Specialists at the new composites centre have already completed designs for a number of fresh products, notable among them key components for use in gas pumping stations, according to UZGTS.

As well as the development of advanced technologies, the Novouralsk centre expects that future increased production would lead to it creating additional high-tech jobs.