Public debates constitute one of the stages of NPP construction. According to the legislation of the Republic of Kazakhstan, public debates differ from public hearings: the purpose of the former is to gauge the public’s attitude to the issue of NPP construction, whereas the latter are held to evaluate design documentation.
About 70% of Kazakhstan’s electricity is produced at coal-fired power plants, the average wear and tear of which stands at 70%, Gulmira Mursalova, Deputy Director of the Department of Atomic Energy and Industry at the Ministry of Energy of Kazakhstan, said at the event. Some of these power plants are to be decommissioned in the next ten years. At the same time, due to power consumption growth (by an average of 3% per year), Kazakhstan is forced to purchase electricity from its neighboring countries.
“In 2023, more than 2 billion kWh out of the 115 billion kWh consumed was purchased from the Russian Federation, as planned. To avoid this in the future, we must take appropriate measures now. Many countries are building NPPs today. China is building 26 reactors, Belarus and the UAE have built their first NPPs, Turkey is building its own NPP, and our neighbor, Uzbekistan, has announced the construction of a small nuclear power plant,” Gulmira Mursalova is quoted as saying by the Kazakh Ministry of Energy.
Earlier, the Directorate for NPP Construction at the Atomic Energy Agency under the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Uzbekistan together with the engineering division of Rosatom State Corporation, Atomstroyexport, signed a contract for the construction of a small nuclear power plant (SNPP) in Uzbekistan. The project will be implemented in the Jizzakh Region in central Uzbekistan, where six reactors with a total capacity of 330 megawatts (MW) will be built. Construction is expected to start as early as this year.
The problem of energy shortages is especially pronounced in the southern regions of Kazakhstan. To address it, the North–South power transmission line is used, which can transmit up to 2,100 MW. However, as Timur Zhantikin, CEO of Kazakhstan Nuclear Power Plants LLP, pointed out at the debates, it is insufficient to supply the southern regions. Meanwhile, according to Alisher Kurbanaliev, Deputy Chairman of the Kazakhstan Electric Power Association, the capacity deficit in the country’s energy system will reach 6% by 2031.
Public debates serve as a prologue to a referendum on the issue of NPP construction, which is tentatively scheduled to take place in the coming fall. Earlier, the Kazakh Ministry of Energy formed a shortlist of technology suppliers for the future NPP. It included China’s CNNC with an HPR-1000 reactor, South Korea’s KHNP with an APR-1400 reactor, France’s EDF with an EPR-1200 reactor and Rosatom with VVER-1200 and VVER-1000 reactors. Construction is scheduled to be completed in 2034.
