Russia to build Baltic nuclear power plant

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: Sergei Kiriyenko, head of the federal agency for nuclear power (Rosatom), has signed the order on the construction of a nuclear power plant in the Kaliningrad Region, Russia’s exclave on the Baltic Sea. Preliminary work for the project is to start in 2009.

Russia decided to build a nuclear power plant in its western-most region to ensure its own energy security, but the new power plant will also export energy to its European neighbours.

New facilities to be built in the special economic zone in the Kaliningrad Region will need guaranteed electricity supplies. Besides, the power bridge that supplies a considerable amount of the region’s electricity is becoming increasingly fragile. The region will be badly short of electricity after the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant in Lithuania, which supplies approximately 30% of the region’s electricity, is shut down.

For safety reasons, the Baltic Nuclear Power Plant will not be built on the coast. A suitable site has been found after a year-long research in the eastern part of the small exclave, which occupies 13,300 sq km, some 120 km (75 miles) from the region’s centre, Kaliningrad.

The Baltic NPP, worth 6 billion euros, will be Russia’s first nuclear project to be built with foreign assistance. Under Russian legislation, nuclear power plants belong to the state, which holds a 51% stake in them. The remaining 49% in the Baltic plant will be offered to foreign partners, first of all European ones. The Russian government plans to attract foreign investors and nuclear organisations, which may supply equipment for the plant.

Rosatom will hold a tender to choose investors and is now analysing their attitude to the project. Potential partners are clearly interested because involvement in the project will benefit them economically and give them access to an asset built on the border with the European Union. Some of them are ready to buy everything they can immediately.

Russia’s EU neighbours are not happy with Russia having a nuclear power plant close to their borders. They argue that Europe has more than enough nuclear facilities and radiation risks are running high. This is indeed so, and the Kaliningrad Region is also located in the zone of risk.

But the truth is that the EU is worried by Russia’s growing influence in the region, which a new nuclear plant will further strengthen. Taking into account the European system of electricity interchange, the Baltic plant will be able to supply electricity far and wide. Experts say its two power units will help diversify Russia’s foreign trade by exporting electricity produced by a nuclear power plant, which can be described as a high-tech product. Russia will make a strong geopolitical move through the Kaliningrad Region, which makes the EU unhappy.

The world needs more and more energy, and that need is feeding a desire to build nuclear power plants. Lithuania, which is being encouraged to shut down its Soviet-era Ignalina NPP, is preparing to build a replacement, Ignalina-2. Belarus will soon hold a tender for its first nuclear power plant, and Estonia and Albania would also like to have nuclear plants.

The countries that have recently learned to enjoy the benefits of energy sufficiency will most likely build more nuclear power plants. Finland is considering the possibility, and French president Nicolas Sarkozy said at a recent EU summit that France would expand its nuclear power programme. One way or another, all of them will have to accept it as a fact of life now that Rosatom’s chief has signed the construction order.