A man fishes with the towering Dukovany nuclear power plant in the background, in Dukovany, Czech Republic, Sept. 27, 2011. South Korea's KHNP won a lucrative public tender to build at least two nuclear reactors in the Czech Republic as the country tries to become more energy independent and wean itself off fossil fuels, the government said, July 17, 2024. AP-Yonhap

A U.S. nuclear energy firm has filed an appeal with the Czech Republic to protest last month's decision to select a South Korean company as the preferred bidder to build two nuclear power units in the Central European country, it said Monday.

Westinghouse Electric Co. lodged the appeal with the Czech Anti-Monopoly Office against the decision to choose Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power (KHNP) for the construction project, the company said, reiterating its intellectual property protection argument.

The U.S. firm said that KHNP's APR1000 and APR1400 plant designs utilize Westinghouse-licensed Generation II System 80 technology, while stressing KHNP neither owns the underlying technology nor has the right to sublicense it to a third party without Westinghouse consent.

"Further, only Westinghouse has the legal right to obtain the required approval from the U.S. government to export its technology," it said in a release posted on its website.

A South Korean consortium, led by KHNP, was named as the preferred bidder for a nuclear power plant project in the Czech Republic last month, which is estimated at around 24 trillion won (US$18.04 billion).

Westinghouse warned that if South Korea's APR1000 reactor is introduced to the Czech Republic, it could lead to a loss of jobs for the U.S. and the European nation.

"In addition to unlawfully using U.S. technology, deploying the APR1000 over the AP1000 reactor would also export the creation of tens of thousands of Czech and U.S. clean energy jobs to Korea, including 15,000 jobs from Westinghouse's home state of Pennsylvania," the firm said.

"Westinghouse will continue to vigorously defend its intellectual property rights and compliance with U.S. export control laws via the ongoing international arbitration and U.S. litigation, respectively."

A decision in the ongoing arbitration case is not expected before the second half of 2025, the company said.

On Saturday, the South Korean presidential office said that it has been in close consultation with the U.S. government to resolve the dispute between KHNP and Westinghouse

In Korea, a debate has lingered over whether South Korea's export of reactors that its companies have domestically mastered with initial technological assistance from the U.S. firm should be subject to U.S. export control regulations. (Yonhap)