OREANDA-NEWS. November 1, 2008. Russia has offered Brazil modern uranium prospecting and mining technologies, new nuclear reactors and super-conducting technologies for energy transmission, Director General of Rosatom State Nuclear Energy corporation Sergey Kiriyenko said after a series of negotiations in Brazil.

“Our first direction is prospecting and mining of natural uranium. I have discussed this possibility with local companies and ministries and they have shown interest.”

“Brazil has prospected only 25%-30% of its territory and has never gone deeper than 100 meters. But even this has given the country 350,000 tons and the 6th place in the world.”

“We are sure that if we apply modern technologies here (and Russia does have such technologies), we may find three, five or even ten times as much uranium as Brazil has today,” Kiriyenko said.

“It would be great news for nuclear power engineers all over the world as some four years ago some experts said that the world’s uranium resources might prove insufficient for large-scale development of nuclear power engineering. The example of Brazil shows that they were wrong,” Kiriyenko said.

The second direction is construction of nuclear power plants.

The unfinished Angra-3 must certainly be finished by those who started it. But, as soon as Brazil decides to develop its nuclear power industry on a large-scale basis, it should better invite several key leaders in the sphere and distribute contracts among them.

Russia is ready to win relevant tenders on an open competition basis, to build nuclear power plants in Brazil, to produce equipment and to actively develop its technological cooperation with your country.

Both Russia and Brazil have vast territories and their key problem is transmission of energy. Brazil is showing high interest in low-temperature conductors and, as one of the world’s leaders in super-conductor production, Russia is ready to share its experience.

Russian-Brazilian cooperation can be successfully developed in nuclear medicine, use of isotopes, modern nuclear science and construction of low and medium capacity nuclear power plants for remote and isolated territories.

However, in order to stimulate inflow of investments Brazil should amend its legislation. “My Brazilian colleagues have asked me about our legislative reforms. I am sure that the same will happen in Brazil,” Kiriyenko said.

“As soon as this happens, we are ready to offer our technologies and to invest money through fair competition with other producers with no claims for monopoly,” Kiriyenko said.

He said that it was early yet to conclude any contracts as the Brazilian Government had not yet made the final decision.

“Today, they are analyzing the international experience. They have told me about our reforms, particularly, about the formation of Rosatom State Corporation, as a single operator on the nuclear energy market, about our nuclear energy development program. We have agreed that several delegations of highly-qualified Brazilian specialists will shortly visit Russia,” Kiriyenko said.

He said that the key result of his meetings in Brazil was the timeliness of the negotiations. He is sure that the decision to develop nuclear energy in Brazil will be passed without fail.

“Presently, 90% of Brazil’s energy is generated by water power plants. But, just like we in Russia have realized that it will not be able to develop its economy by just burning oil and gas, they in Brazil have also beginning to see that they will not be able to build their whole economy on water energy,” Kiriyenko said.