— Nuclear power sector is becoming priority

«The past year was special in over 60-year history of Rosatom. In fact, it was a year of changes. A new generation of modern highly-qualified managers led by Sergey Kiriyenko have come into the sector and have started system reforms in the organizational, financial, economic and technological aspects,» says Director General of the Union of Employers of Nuclear Power Industry and Science of Russia Visingirey Gagiyev:

What key points of Rosatom’s work in the last year would you point out?

The work started with the formation of a legislative basis. The Government enacted a federal target program «The development of Russia’s Nuclear Power Complex in 2007–2010 and till 2015.» The State Duma approved the first reading of a bill «On the Peculiarities of the Management of the Property and Shares of Organizations Using Nuclear Energy and On Relevant Changes in Some Legislative Acts of the Russian Federation.» These and other legislative acts constitute the legislative basis for the reformation of the sector.

In 2006 we intensified the construction of the 4th BN-800 unit of Beloyarsk NPP and launched the projects to build the 4th unit of Kalinin NPP and the first floating KLT-40C reactor NPP.

The victory in the tender for building Belene NPP in Bulgaria was the first victory of the Russian nuclear power engineers on the European NPP construction market since the Soviet times. The contractor of the project is Atomstroyexport, who is simultaneously building 5 nuclear power units in China, India and Iran.

The Russian-Kazakh Zarechnoye JV started extracting uranium at a capacity of 1,000 tons a year. It is the first Russian uranium extraction project abroad. There are two more Russian-Kazakh JVs. The Kazakh uranium will be enriched on a special site at the Angarsk Electrolytic Chemical Combine.

TVEL Corporation won the international tender for fueling Temelin NPP (the Czech Republic).

The authorities took practical steps to solve the problem of the village of Muslumovo: the problem of the Techa reservoir cascade. In Oct 2006 the Government instructed Rosatom to allocate 600mln RUR for overcoming the social-economic consequences of the activities of the Mayak production association. The money will be spent on the resettlement of the Muslumovo residents.

Rosatom set up JVs with machine building companies — the only producers of equipment for NPPs. 2006 saw big achievements in the social sphere.

Still, the key achievement of the past ear is the drastic change in the attitude towards nuclear power engineering. This sector is beginning to regain its priority status.

What is the reason for such a turnabout?

There are several reasons. Organic fuel — particularly, carbohydrates — is getting more and more expensive as it is growing increasingly scarce — even in Russia. Experts say that economic gas reserves will suffice for 20–30 years. In his time, Mendeleyev said that it is better to burn bank-notes than oil and gas. They can be more effectively used in the chemical and oil-chemical industries. The reserves of coal, especially of brown coal, are quite large but they are concentrated in remote regions of Siberia and Far East.
 
The second reason is the indisputable advantages of nuclear power engineering: it is economical, ecologically clean and… why not, safe, especially given the post-Chernbyl large-scale safety enhancement measures and the promising projects of our research and development institutes, particularly, fast breeder reactors. 

The third reason: Russia’s nuclear power industry has been and will be one of the most science-intensive and competitive branches on the world market. It has a huge development potential. According to Rosenergoatom, in 2006 the capacity factor of the Russian NPPs grew by 2.5%. Last year the Russian NPPs produced a total of 154.6bln KWh.

And the last reason is that today we do have capacities to actively finance NPP construction and to ensure their high profitability.
Today, our priority is to build and launch no less than 2 nuclear power units a year with a view to have 40 units by 2030 and to increase the share of nuclear power in the total energy production to 25%. This is a very difficult but very important task.