Having spent five years combining its nuclear power, engineering and research enterprises into the single entity of Rosatom, the Russian government now sees privatisation of the firm as part of a plan for industrial modernisation.
Rosatom is just one of several vertically integrated state holding companies Russia established to "discourage the decline of the more intellectual sectors of national industry" in the post-Soviet era, wrote Vladimir Putin in the Vedomosti newspaper on 30 January.
German industrial and engineering conglomerate Siemens is to withdraw entirely from the nuclear industry.
The move is a response to the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan in March, chief executive Peter Loescher said.
He told Spiegel magazine it was the firm's answer to "the clear positioning of German society and politics for a pullout from nuclear energy".
Initial construction work at the Belarus nuclear power plant will begin in August or September 2011, First Vice Prime Minister Vladimir Smeashko said on Monday, February 14.
"We are beginning to build a nuclear power plant this year. The preparatory period is drawing to an end, the document has been signed, according to which initial construction work will begin from the end of August or the beginning of September," he said.
Russian nuclear power engineering company Atomstroyexport has advised its owner, state power corporation Rosatom, to drop Bulgaria's Belene nuclear power project, French daily La Tribune reported, citing a letter that Atomstroyexport sent to its parent.
Rosatom told Dnevnik it would not comment on the letter as it was an internal document and the company was yet to decide whether to exit the project. The proposed withdrawal would be considered a possibility only if Rosatom failed to sign its 12th consecutive agreement with Bulgaria, the company said.
While RWE insisted that its withdrawal from the project, which has yet to get off the ground, was due entirely to financial concerns, the February 2009 secret US embassy cable indicates that safety concerns and shady business practices by other partners were a factor in the German firm's decision to leave in October 2009.
Qatar’s prime minister met French president Nicolas Sarkozy this week in an attempt to resolve the stalemate over a capital increase for Areva, the French state-owned nuclear group.
Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabr al-Thani was in Paris for a stopover to discuss the terms of Qatar’s proposed investment in Areva.
Bulgarian Parliament Chair Tsacheva has made promising hints about the fate of the Belene nuclear power plant. Photo by BGNES
Bulgarian will for sure build its second nuclear power plant at Belene, Parliament Chair Tsetska Tsacheva has declared.
The incident at Unit 6 of the Kozloduy Nuclear Power Plant poses no risk to people's health or to the energy system, Economy, Energy and Tourism Minister Traicho Traikov told journalists on Tuesday.Traikov ruled out radiation risk or any other risk to people's health at the power plant.
MOSCOW — The Russian nuclear industry has profited handsomely from building reactors in developing countries, including India, China and Iran. Now it is testing the prospect of becoming a major supplier to the European Union, too.
Russia (Reuters) - Russia on Wednesday took a big step toward the controversial creation of the world's first floating nuclear power station, putting a barge that will house the plant into the water.
Environmentalists say Russia's plan to dot its northern coastline with floating nuclear power plants is risky.
