/ world today news/ It is a great honor for us that “Rosatom” was invited to participate in the work on extending the life of units 5 and 6 of the Kozloduy NPP.
This is a wonderful example of full cooperation between companies from different countries. Not only Rosatom participates in this project. Our partners are the French “Electrites de France” and even the American “Westinghouse”. Each of these companies is carrying out an important part of the modernization of the two units.
Rosatom does not plan to end its work on extending the life of the Kozloduy NPP. We perfectly understand that Bulgaria needs this electricity very much. Today, 40% of Bulgaria’s electricity is produced by the nuclear power plant built according to a Russian project.
“Rosatom” remains faithful to its main principle: we always faithfully fulfill our commitments under the contracts we have concluded. This also applies to Bulgaria. Although we have an arbitration dispute in connection with the Belene NPP, we continue to regularly and accurately deliver nuclear fuel to the operating two units of the Kozloduy NPP.
Not even for a moment did Rosatom try to do something dirty or take advantage. And we never will. We will not use the created situation as a tool to solve our own issues, although we disagree with the position of the Bulgarian government, which stopped the Belene NPP project and caused us damage.
Both in Bulgaria and around the world, Rosatom fulfills its commitments. An example of this is the “Megatons in megawatts” program, which was implemented for 20 years between the USA and Russia /1993-2013/. During this period, relations between Washington and Moscow were not unambiguous – there were periods of good cooperation, periods of cool relations and even very cool ones. But this did not for a second lead to the termination of this treaty by either the Russian or the American side. We correctly delivered enriched uranium to the US, and they regularly paid each other. Thanks to this cooperation, over 50% of all US nuclear power plants during this period operated with Russian enriched uranium. Every 10 light bulbs in the US were lit thanks to this contract. Today, we are 100% fulfilling our commitments related to the supply of nuclear fuel and the removal of spent fuel from Ukraine.
Everyone perfectly understands that nuclear energy is such a sensitive area of international cooperation that it should be the last area to be affected by any sanctions. All projects in this field are long-term. We have said many times that the construction of the NPP is a project for the next 100 years – 10 years of construction, 60 years of operation, another 20-30 years of extending the resource of the NPP, then decommissioning. This is a very long time and many things can happen, but political turbulence should not affect nuclear power projects.
Whether we are working with Americans, Europeans or Asians, we firmly believe that nuclear energy must remain out of politics and contracts must be implemented. We are 100% committed to these principles and will follow them.
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Kiril Komarov, first deputy general director of the state corporation “Rosatom”. This text is an answer to a question from BGNES about the influence of Western sanctions on the corporation’s international activities and whether the situation will affect the extension of the life of units 5 and 6 of the Kozloduy NPP. Kiril Komarov took part in the Seventh International Forum “Atomexpo 2015”, which is being held in Moscow.
Moscow / Russia
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