OREANDA-NEWS. December 14, 2012.  A round-table session on public acceptance of the construction of Belarus NPP was held with participation of St. Petersburg Atomenergoproekt in Minsk. Local and international experts, Russian partners of the NPP construction project in Ostrovets – representatives of ROSATOM and St. Petersburg Atomenergoproekt – expressed their opinions on the nuclear power development prospects in the Republic of Belarus.

As a supplier of power generation technologies to the international market, the Russian nuclear industry has a number of competitive advantages, namely, the reference, licesnseability of designs, safety concept based on optimal combination of active and passive safety systems. This is true about the AES-2006 design, which is implemented in the Republic of Belarus. In addition, as Sergey Boyarkin, Director of ROSATOM’s programs, emphasized the Russian state-owned corporation, being a responsible supplier, renders support to the customer in creating own industrial capacities for manufacturing the equipment for NPPs, the nuclear regulatory framework, the staff training system, and offers a financial solution for the project implementation; all these ensure actual safety of a strategic facility as the nuclear power plant. Sergey Boyarkin also noted that the AES-2006 designer, SPbAEP, was the key organization of the Russian nuclear industry in terms of design competences.

Sergey Svetlov, the Chief Project Engineer at SPbAEP, presented on the evolution of design solutions reflected in Belarus NPP project. The main goal of changes is to improve safety systems, while enhancing economic parameters of the power unit. Innovative systems used in the design include the core melt trap, system for heat removal from the turbine generator and reactor pressure vessel, and hydrogen evacuation system.

The international experts offered the Belarus party recommendations on the sustainable development of nuclear power. In particular, Nikolai Shteinberg, the Chairman of the Advisory Board of the State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate of Ukraine, drew attention to the necessity of achieving neat systemic operation of the regulatory authority in regard of the nuclear industry and its support by research and development.

The round-table session experts reviewed a combined impact of the NPP construction in Belarus on the Europe’s energy system, various spheres of the country’s economy development, quality of living, environment, and supported the opinion that it is necessary to implement advanced energy technologies, which include nuclear.