OREANDA-NEWS. August 12, 2009. Atomtechenergo OJSC (subsidiary of Atomenergoprom OJSC), on the request of Atomstroyexport CJSC, will design a training center for Belene Nuclear Power Plant (Bulgaria), reported the press-centre of Minatom. 

It will be the first training center to be built for a foreign nuclear power plant for teaching foreign specialists to operate nuclear reactors of Russian design.

It will be a turnkey project. The center will train the whole operating personnel of Belene NPP (no less than 670 specialists). This facility will have all necessary organizational, methodological and educational materials, class rooms, simulators and highly qualified instructors.

Director of Atomtechenero OJSC Eduard Saakov says that the operating personnel of Belene NPP will be trained by both Russian and Bulgarian instructors on the basis of the best international experience. This will guarantee high quality of training and prevention of any risks related to the human factor.

Presently, Atomtechenergo OJSC is drafting the technical requirements and the technical project, selecting the necessary equipment and designing the simulator. The engineering work will be followed by construction and equipping.

Specialists of Atomtechenergo have many-year unique experience of personnel training at special training centers. So, the center of Belene NPP will set the highest possible professional requirements to the trainees. Besides having a simulator, the center will offer courses on electrical engineering, automated process control system, repair of fittings, revolving gears, containers and heat exchanges. There will be lots of computer aided systems and relevant software and educational and methodological materials.

Atomtechenergo has two branches – Novovoronezh Training Center and Smolensk Training Center – training personnel to operate and maintain WWER- and RBMK-type reactors.

Novovoronezh Training Center trains operators of WWER and has simulators, class rooms and highly qualified instructors. Smolensk Training Center specializes in training operating personnel for RBMK.

The centers have so far trained 5,397 specialists for foreign nuclear power plants, particularly, for Tianwan NPP (China), Kudankulam NPP (India), Bushehr NPP (Iran). In 2008 the centers trained over 4,900 specialists for Russian NPPs.