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Move to set up 1000 MW power plant within decade

Russian team arrives tomorrow to discuss project issues

UNB, Dhaka
The government is keen to go ahead with the nuclear power plant project with view to setting up at least a 1000 MW plant in the country within a decade.
Normally, it needs eight to nine years to set up a 600-1000 MW power plant in any country, as it requires fulfilling many conditions.
According to official sources, right now the government has three initial proposals from three countries -• Russia, China and South Korea.
But the Russian proposal tops the list, as the nuclear-rich country has been keen to move ahead with the Bangladesh pro ject under a statc-to-state bilateral agreement.
As part of the move, the Russian ambassador in Dhaka recently met with State Minister for Science and ICTYeafesh Osman to discuss the project related issues.
As follow-up of the envoy's move, a Russian technical expert team will arrive in the country tomorrow and will stay here three days to discuss the proposed power plant issues with the authorities.
Science and ICT Ministry officials hinted that Bangladesh might move for an unsolicited offer-based project to implement the nuclear power plant project.
In that case, the present public pro- curement regulation (PPR) may need certain changes.
But the main problem to deal with the project will be mobilising funds in the present perspective of global financial economic meltdown. Because, a 1000 MW nuclear power plant will need a USS 1.2-1.5 billion investment.
The move for installing a nuclear power plant was originally initiated dur ing the previous BNP regime. Later, the caretaker government had expedited the process and obtained a clearance certificate from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to go ahead with a nuclear power plant project.
The caretaker government also launched a site preparation project at Rooppur with technical and financial support of the IAEA to make the site suitable for a power plant.
The IAEA provided USS 366,000 for the project. Rooppur is a very old site, which was first undertaken by the then East Pakistan government for die same purpose.
"The site preparatory project is going on in full swing and it would be completed by the end of the year," said a top official of the Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission (BAEC), which has been implementing the project.
He also mentioned that an IAEA technical team also visited the site in November to have a physical inspection
before giving its necessary nod to Bangladesh.
"Simultaneously, a safeguard document and a model agreement document are now at the final stage of preparation. After completion, we've to place It to the IAEA," the BAEC official said.
Science and ICT Ministry officials said that the nuclear power plant operation is a very sensitive work and it needs highly skilled manpower.
But Bangladesh docs not have such manpower available at present. So, from now on a strong move should be made to develop skilled manpower to run a future project, a senior official at the Science and ICT Ministry said.
He also mentioned that the government had approached the IAEA to provide technical support to create such trained and skilled manpower.
According to another top official of BAEC, at present world's 23 percent electricity comes from nuclear plants.
Neighbouring India is leading in nuclear power generation in the South Asian region as it has 17 nuclear power plants while another five is under construction.
Russia generates 17 percent of its total electricity from nutlear plants while USA generates 20 percent. France leads in nuclear power generation among the European nations.