Plans to decide on license to operate first unit of Belarusian nuclear power plant in May

MINSK, 14 April (BelTA) – The matter of granting the license to operate the first unit of the Belarusian nuclear power plant is supposed to be discussed in May. First Deputy Head of the Nuclear and Radiation Safety Department of the Belarusian Emergencies Ministry (Gosatomnadzor) Leonid Dedul made the statement in BelTA's press center on 14 April.

The official said: “The commissioning of the nuclear power plant involves several stages, including the physical launch and the reactor power startup. The pilot commercial operation stage is in progress now and provides for over 250 tests. They are in the final phase now.”

The correct operation of all the systems is being checked in the course of startup and commissioning procedures. To make sure the equipment operates within designed parameters was the key goal. “One can actually say that the parameters have been reached in all the tests. The results are being processed now. The reports will be forwarded to the regulating authority. Once the nuclear power plant operating company confirms they are ready for commercial operation, we will consider granting the license. We expect it will happen in May,” he said.

The Belarusian nuclear power plant is being built near Ostrovets, Grodno Oblast using the Russian design AES-2006 featuring two VVER-1200 reactors with the total output capacity of 2,400MW.