Power utility Slovenské Elektrárne (SE) has signed a contract with an alternative
supplier of nuclear fuel.
“In order to diversify fuel supply, we entered into a contract for the supply of enriched uranium for power plants we operate with an alternative supplier, effective from 2015,” SE spokeswoman Janka Burdová told the vEnergetike.sk website. “The signing of the agreement is one of the results of the long-term project Diversification of Fuels for SE that has lasted for several years.”
The power utility did not want to specify yet with which company it signed the contract. According to information available to vEnergetike.sk, it is the French company Areva. The Slovak dominant electricity producer did not specify the contract details either – such as how much nuclear fuel from the alternative supplier will replace Russian nuclear fuel in four nuclear reactors in
Slovakia, if any at all.
Slovenské Elektrárne which operates two nuclear units at the nuclear power plant (NPP) Jaslovské Bohunice and two at NPP Mochovce currently has a contract signed for the supply of nuclear fuel with the Russian company TVEL, the SITA newswire wrote. It was signed in 2008 and came into force in 2011. The Russian newswire Ria Novosti informed then that this was a contract worth €500 million. When the contract was signed, the companies also signed an agreement that talks about conditions of cooperation also after 2015, whereby this agreement foresees that TVEL would produce and supply nuclear fuel for existing as well as for planned reactors in Slovakia.
Slovakia will be the only country in the central-European region to import nuclear fuel from other country than Russia, the Hospodárske Noviny economic daily wrote, also calling French Areva as the replacement.
(Source: vEnergetike.sk, SITA, Hospodárske noviny)
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
The Slovak Spectator cannot vouch for the accuracy of the information presented in its Flash News postings.
