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Bulgarian premier praises Belene NPP project

The plant uses Russian technologies, but the turbine can be US-made, Boyko Borisov said

SOFIA, November 26. /TASS/. Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borisov said he had spoken highly of the Belene nuclear power plant project during his meeting with US President Donald Trump.

"We discussed the Belene issue for about 15 minutes. [The US side] initially claimed that Belene is a Russian NPP, but [I assured Trump] that this is not so, because Belene is a 100% Bulgarian nuclear power plant, we own both of its reactors. It uses Russian technologies, but the turbine, for example, can be US-made. Belene is a magnificent project," Borisov said in the Kanal-3 TV channel broadcast, aired on Monday night.

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Rosatom ready for international cooperation in Belene NPP project

"US experts will arrive to Bulgaria in coming days and familiarize themselves with the project in detail. They will see reactors and other facitlities, both at Belene and at the Kozloduy NPP," the Bulgarian premier continued.

He did not rule out the possibility of using US-made nuclear fuel at Bulgarian nuclear power plants.

In 2006, Atomstroyexport (an affiliate of the Russian nuclear corporation Rosatom) won an international tender for the construction of two power units at the Belene plant. The required equipment was delivered to the site, but in 2009 the project was halted. In March 2012, Sofia abandoned plans to build a two-unit Belene nuclear power plant with capacity of 2 GW. The government of Bulgaria, which at that time was headed by current Prime Minister Boyko Borisov, announced the termination of the project.

On May 12, 2018, Borisov said that the country intends to resume the construction of the nuclear power plant. The tender for NPP construction was announced in 2019. The strategic investor qualification procedure was published on May 22 of this year. The procedure is to be completed in 12 months from the publication date.

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