Armenia advised to build one more power plant reactor

ITAR-TASS News Agency
TASS
June 24, 2005 Friday 4:42 AM Eastern Time

Armenia advised to build one more power plant reactor

By Vitaly Matarykin

KIEV

Western experts consider it is expedient for Armenia to build one
more nuclear power plant unit to meet the country’s power needs for
the period till 2025, the head of the Armenian Energy Ministry’s
atomic energy department, Aram Gevorkyan, told reporters. In Kiev on
June 23, he participated in the meeting of the CIS commission on
peaceful atomic energy use.

It is a conclusion of specialists of the PA Consulting Group
international company.

In the Armenian Energy Ministry this week, they presented the atomic
energy part of their report on development of the country’s energy
sector.

Construction of a new reactor is advantageous, with the oil and gas
price increase forecast taken into consideration.

At the same time, the reactor construction cost is estimated at one
billion dollars, and it is a highly costly project for the country’s
budget.

The Armenian legislation envisages any kind of nuclear power plant
ownership, including private, and so, investments of companies and
banks for the project are not ruled out.

It is expedient to build the reactor on the Armenian power plant
ground designed for four reactors, Gevorkyan said.

PA Consulting Group won the tender of the USA ID agency to study
possibilities to develop Armenia’s energy sector with a minimum cost
till 2025.

Projects to build hydroelectric, thermo and other stations are also
under consideration.

The report will be ready by 2006.

The Armenian nuclear power plant began working in 1979, and its work
was halted in 1989 after the devastating earthquake. With Russian
specialists’ assistance, the plant resumed operating in 1996 as its
second unit was restarted.

The plant accounts for about 40 percent of the electricity produced
in Armenia.

Management of the financial and economic activates of the station was
transferred in 2002 to Inter UES, a subsidiary of the Russian Unified
Energy Systems company.