Iran To Take Temporary Control Of Bushehr Power Plant By Next 3 Months

Bushehr, Sept 23, IRNA – Vice-President and head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Fereydoun Abbasi said on Saturday that Iran will take temporary control of Bushehr power plant by the next three months based on latest estimates. Talking to reporters, Abbasi said however, the predictable date for the delivery will be the end of the current Iranian year (March 2013). He said that the power plant is currently operating at its maximum capacity, generating 1000 megawatts of power. He said that 910 megawatts of the output goes to national grid and the remaining goes to the power plant’s own needs. He said based on Majlis approval, planning is underway to build 20 nuclear power plants with capacity of 1,000 megawatts each to generate 20,000 metwatts of electricity. Igor Mezenin, local operation chief of the nuclear plant's Russian contractor, told RIA Novosti news agency earlier this month that the power unit at Bushehr would be handed over to Iran "in the last week of December". Before that, Atomstroyexport, the Russian contractor, would conduct a serial of trails, Mezenin said. The reactor of the plant's unit reached its full capacity on August 31. Russia's state atomic agency Rosatom said in May that it was ready to help Iran build another unit at the Bushehr nuclear power plant. Atomstroyexport, an engineering company of Rosatom, said Bushehr, the first nuclear power plant in Iran, successfully reached 90 percent of its nominal capacity in routine trials in early May./end