Russia reassures Vietnam on nuclear reactor safety

Vietnam has nothing to fear about the safety of the Russian-made nuclear reactors to be used in its first nuclear power plant.

The design of the reactor of the Ninh Thuan Nuclear Power Plant satisfies the highest international safety standards, said Petr Shchedrovitsky, advisor of the General Director of Russia’s state-owned Rosatom atomic energy group.

“Vietnam can be completely assured of Russian nuclear power safety standards. It is very difficult to have such an incident at Vietnam’s reactor like the one at Japan’s Fukushima plant,” Shchedrovitsky noted.

“Russian safety standards are always stricter than international standards. Nuclear power plants built by Russia are all absolutely safe. Designs of reactors are vigilant against all possible incidents.”

He said Japan’s ill-fated Fukushima reactor was built 40 years ago while that of Vietnam will belong to the more modern “3+ generation” of nuclear reactors.

Shchedrovitsky said the technology behind this new generation is used by around 80% of nuclear power plants in the world.

The Ninh Thuan nuclear power plant will have two turbines with a combined output of 4,000 MW. Construction of the first plant is to begin in 2014 and is to start operating in 2020. The plant will use Russian technology.