– The agreements I signed ten years ago are being successfully implemented today

The key results of the past year are the launch of Tianwan NPP in China, the supply of fuel to Bushehr NPP in Iran, the successfully construction of Kudankulam NPP in India and Rosatom’s active efforts to increase its uranium resources.

I am glad that the agreements I signed ten years ago as Minister of Nuclear Energy are being successfully implemented today.

The 1st and 2nd units of Tianwan NPP in China have already generated several billions of KW of cheap electricity. Tianwan NPP is one of the best in the world and the best in China – in terms of both economy and safety.

The construction of Bushehr NPP in Iran is a hard project but Russia is successfully completing it due to Rosatom’s effective steps. Of course, the first steps are always difficult to take but we are learning and developing and our next projects will be based on the unique experience we are acquiring today.

The Kudankulam NPP project (India) is well underway. In Jan 2007 we signed a memorandum on the construction of four more units at Kudankulam and other sites in addition to the two ones we are building at present.

I regret that in my time I failed to finish the project in Cuba. That plant is almost 85% ready.

One more important step of Rosatom this year is enlargement of our uranium reserves. We are spending big money on uranium prospecting in Russia and are ready to mine uranium in any territory in any place on the globe. This is a strategic decision, which will give us fuel for our development program.

In Sept 2007 Russia signed a bilateral agreement for the peaceful use of nuclear energy with Australia, particularly, for the use of Australian uranium at Russian companies.

We have big uranium reserves. I think that they will suffice as for the next 100 years.

One of the key events of the past year is the launch of the federal program for the construction of new nuclear power plants, particularly, the start of Leningrad NPP-2 and Novovoronezh NPP-2 projects.

In order to carry out this ambitious program we need to restore our machine building industry. We need integration, we live in an integrating world, integration will certainly help us to strengthen our positions on the world market. One example is the establishment of a joint venture with Alstom (France) – a low-speed turbine production at ZiO-Podolsk.

Small capacity reactors are one more promising project. Lots of countries and our northern areas need small reactors (200MW-300MW). I think that these reactors have excellent prospects.

We have big achievements in the design of fast-breeder reactors.

The reformation of our nuclear industry is a positive process. I think that the goals we are setting today are quite achievable and are worth of being achieved. We can’t do everything at once but we are moving in the right direction.