22 January 2014
Construction of Vietnam’s first nuclear power plant is likely to be delayed until 2020 instead of 2014 as previously scheduled.
Vietnam awarded the contract to Atomstroieksport, a subsidiary of Russia’s state nuclear energy firm Rosatom, to build the Ninh Thuan 1 plant in Ninh Thuan Province.
Speaking to Tuoi Tre (the Youth) online newspaper, deputy director general of the general directorate of energy under Vietnam’s ministry of trade and industry (MoIT), Le Tuan Phong, said the delay is to ensure the safety and efficient exploitation of the nuclear power plant.
Located in the Ninh Thuan province, the construction of Vietnam’s first nuclear power plant is likely to be delayed until 2020 (Wikimedia Commons)
Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has now told officials at state-run oil and gas group Petrovietnam the company will have to step up supply of gas to cover the nuclear delay.
"Petrovietnam must ensure enough gas supply to build a 5,000-megawatt power plant complex to replace 4,000 megawatts of nuclear power," Mr Dung was cited as saying by the youth newspaper in the company’s year-end meeting.
The Vietnamese National Assembly committee on science, technology and environment said that construction of infrastructure including roads, electricity and water supply associated with the project can begin this year.
The construction of reactors can only be started at the end of 2017 and early 2018 when the technical designs of the plant are approved and licensed.
