Iran about to commission its first A-plant

A Russian-Iranian ceremony in Bushehr on the Persian Gulf on Monday will mark the commissioning of the first generating unit of Iran’s first commercial nuclear power plant. Already on the A-plant list of the International Atomic Energy Agency and also tested and connected to the national grid last Saturday, the unit will start operating at its full design capacity of one thousand megawatts.

The project was started in 1974 with assistance from Germany. For a host of political and economic reasons, however, the Germans subsequently pulled out. Russia’s Atomenergostroy company took up where they left.

The Voice of Russia heard about this from the Russian nuclear safety expert Dr Anton Khlopkov:

"Bushehr is an unparalleled instance in technological integration between Russia and Germany. The Russian contractors successfully pulled off the task and built a plant that can work quite safely."

According to the IAEA, which tracked Bushehr from inception, the plant is safe and complies with international counter-proliferation requirements.

Iran is under UN sanctions for refusing to disclose sensitive details of its nuclear energy programme. Powers in the West suspect it of hiding nuclear weapons plans. Russia disagrees, arguing that the Iranians are light-years away from acquiring a capability to generate weapons-grade fissile materials. Fortunately, Bushehr is outside the UN sanctions, because the fuel for it is to be produced and reprocessed in Russia.

Iran has plans to boost its nuclear generating capacity to at least 20 megawatts and pins hopes for this on cooperation with Russia.

Mr Mehdi Sanai is a senior Iranian lawmaker:

"Bushehr epitomizes cooperation, Russian help and excellent performance by Russian nuclear contractors. By bringing the project to fruition, Russia has convinced Iran and the entire world that it can build modern A-units very quickly, very safely, on time and on budget. I will not be surprised if other Asian powers seek Russian help in developing nuclear energy."

And seek they do, as Russia is close to winning a contract to build an A-plant in Jordan, which currently imports 97 percent of its electricity.

Fukushima has somewhat dampened the nuclear renaissance in Europe, but not in Asia. Bushehr is Asia’s fourth nuclear unit to be commissioned this year. The first three were in India, Pakistan and China. India and Pakistan are each building one more nuclear unit. A rocketing demand for electricity in great Asian economies makes nuclear energy absolutely indispensable. Bushehr shows, among other things, that modern technologies can make nuclear power 100-percent safe.

Source: Voice of Russia