Konstantin Zaytsev, vice chairman of Committee on Energy

– We are interested in Japanese nuclear reactor construction technologies

On Mar 20 Atomenergoatom OJSC (Russia) and Toshiba (Japan) signed an agreement to develop cooperation in the field of peaceful use of nuclear energy stipulating joint projects to design and build nuclear reactors and to manufacture products and services of nuclear fuel cycle.

I am sure that in the near future nuclear energy will develop much quicker than the other types of energy. In the last year a whole number of countries – both those having no NPPs yet and the ones who once refused to build any more NPPs – have expressed wish to develop nuclear energy. The United States and China are going to build over 100 reactors, India – almost 40, the United Kingdom – over 10. Lithuania, Poland, Turkey, Finland, Bulgaria also have plans to build nuclear reactors. Experts say that as many as 600 reactors will be under construction in the near future! Naturally, only big trans-national corporations can do it. That’s exactly why a number of companies have decided to merge. As a result, today, we have three foreign leaders in the nuclear energy sector: Areva-Siemens (France-Germany), Toshiba-Westinghouse and General Electric-Hitachi (US-Japan). Despite certain peculiarities, those companies are almost equal in their financial and industrial strength and are worthy rivals to one another. To build one nuclear reactor costs some $2bln. So, you can imagine the size of this market.
  
A year ago we started large-scale reforms in our nuclear industry and it was clear that very soon we would create a big nuclear holding. Foreign experts foretold a big advantage to the one who will be able to agree with Atomenergoprom. So, the agreement signed by Toshiba-Westinghouse and Atomenergoprom today is exactly what they predicted. This agreement will give the Japanese-American alliance a big advantage: our technologies are the very lacking link in their nuclear fuel cycle. We will also be at profit: the Japanese can build nuclear reactors in just 36 months, while we build them in 5 years!

Note

Toshiba Corporation is a Japanese producer of nuclear reactors. In 2006 it bought 77% of shares of Westinghouse Electric, who has built most of nuclear reactors in the United States.

Atomenergoprom holding comprises civil nuclear companies of Russia and is among the four biggest producers of nuclear fuel cycle services in the world. The other three leaders are Toshiba-Westinghouse, Areva-Siemens and GE-Hitachi.