Explosive friendship

Russia and the United States became nuclear partners despite many political disagreements between the two countries, on the last day of Vladimir Putin, the Americans presented him with a nuclear gift. Yesterday in Moscow, the general director of the Rosatom State Corporation Sergey Kiriyenko and the US Ambassador to Russia William Burns signed an intergovernmental agreement on cooperation in the field of peaceful use of atomic energy, thereby deleting the last rudiment of the Cold War.

The agreement has created a legal framework for future projects between Russian and American companies. For Russian technologies, the doors of the American market will first open, the capacity of which is estimated at at least $ 100 billion.

The promised 20 years are waiting

The compilation has opened up the possibility of cooperation over the entire spectrum of nuclear technologies to two countries. “Before that, no nuclear materials and equipment from the United States could cross the Russian border, and vice versa. American Uranus is the last that Russia could not import into its territory. Now it can, ”said Sergey Kiriyenko after the ceremony. “In the past, the United States and Russia were rivals in the nuclear industry, and now we are partners,” William Burns answered reciprocally.

The parties have been waiting for this agreement for almost 20 years. The process moved out of a dead point when the presidents of the two countries Vladimir Putin and George Bush at the Big Eight summit in St. Petersburg in July 2006 gave relevant instructions to the governments of their countries. In preliminary negotiations, Russia supported the US initiative to create a global nuclear partnership (the so -called GNEP project) and offered the American nuclear industry in the project of creating in Angarsk an international center for enrichment of Uranus. In return, Russian nuclear workers will receive free (without barrage duties) and a straight (without the participation of a monopoly intermediary in the person of USEC) access to the American market, in particular, for the supply of uranium.

VOU-Now Problems

Russian nuclear fuel is already imported in the United States. More than half of the American nuclear power plants are dependent on the supplies under the VOU-NOU program. This Russian -American agreement (Megaton - in Megavatts) was concluded in 1993 as part of the disarmament program. Russia then pledged to supply a low -enriched uranium made from highly enriched weapons uranium to the United States. The program finishes its action in 2013, Russia is not going to extend it, since an agreement is concluded on unprofitable conditions for it. Thus, in a few years, the United States will be needed by new sources of uranium and power to enrich it in the country.

In early 2008, the United States has already taken the first step - they canceled a barrage fee against Russian Uranus. In 2011, a fee of 112%, introduced by the US Ministry of Education in the early 1990s, will cease to operate. And since 2014, Russia plans to put up to 485 tons in the United States. According to experts, this volume will allow Russia to occupy about a fifth of the US market.

Export diffusion

To contribute to the cooperation of the two countries will be the fact that in the United States, like around the world, due to rising prices for hydrocarbons, interest in atomic energy is rapidly increasing. Now more than 100 nuclear power plants are operating in the United States, but the resource of most of them will soon be exhausted: from the late 1970s, nuclear power plants have not been built in the United States. For several years now, US President George Bush talks about the resumption of atomstroy. Nevertheless, Americans will no longer be able to do this on their own. In 2006, the Japanese Toshiba bought 77% of the shares of the largest American Corporation Westinghouse. And in March of this year, Toshiba signed the Rosatom, thus creating the most powerful transnational alliance in the world, the capabilities of which will exceed the capabilities of two competitors-the US-Japanese GE-HITACHI and the European Areva-Siemens.

Moreover, American companies cannot enrich Uranus at the proper level. In the Westinghouse arsenal, only diffusion technology. Rosatom has the most modern - gas -centrifuge, which is several orders of magnitude more effective than diffusion.

The first contract

There is already a potential partner. The American energy company PG & E is ready to create a joint venture with Rosatom to enrich Uranus in the United States. Now the Russian side is conducting active negotiations. The plant’s project is designed for a capacity of at least 3 million ERR (units of division) per year, the value in the state corporation has not yet been talked.

They plan to supply Uranus for enrichment from several countries, including from Russia, in the Ministry of Natural Resources, by 2020, it is calculated to increase the increase in reserves by three and a half times. The closest to the Canadian sales market. At the end of last year, Russia signed a contract with her on the creation of a joint venture for geological exploration and production of natural uranium. In addition, there are agreements with other manufacturers - Australia and Kazakhstan.

05/07/2008 / Evgeny Belyakov, the material was published in the "newspaper" No. 83 dated 05.05.2008.