RIA Novosti, Russia
Aug 26 2004

ARMENIAN NUCLEAR POWER PLANT TO RESUME WORK AFTER CAPITAL REPAIRS

YEREVAN, August 26 (RIA Novosti’s Gamlet Matevosyan) – The Armenian
nuclear power plant, its work suspended for capital repairs, will be
switched on on October 4. Capital repairs are carried out once in
four years while a planned repair is staged every year.

This time the fourth turbine is to be repaired and the state of the
reactor’s metallic frame is to be fully checked. Besides, additional
security measures and the re-fueling process will be introduced.

The process of closing the nuclear plant for capital repairs and
re-fueling started in the early hours of July 30, 2004, a week after
the delivery of the new nuclear fuel consignment worth $12 million
had been accomplished.

The Armenian nuclear plant was commissioned in 1980 and closed in
March 1989. It resumed its work in November 1995, following the acute
energy crisis in the republic.

Equipped with the Russian reactor VVEP-400 of the first generation,
the plant’s second module generates the average of 30-40 percent of
the republic’s electricity. The station can function until 2016,
according to experts.

In September 2003, the Armenian nuclear plant was passed for five
years under trusteeship of the company INTER RAO UES, a subsidiary of
the Unified Energy Systems of Russia and the Rosenergoatom concern.

The European Union has pledged to allocate 100 million euros for the
conservation of the Armenian nuclear plant. But Armenian experts say
that almost a million euros is required to set up alternative
capacities in Armenia.