On April 25, 2019, the ad interim governor of the Kursk Region Roman Starovoyt paid his first working visit to the Kursk NPP and the construction site of the replacing Kursk NPP-2.

The goal of the trip was to get acquainted with the Kursk NPP, one of the major enterprises in the region, which accounts for 25% of the manufacturing output in the Kursk Region.

‘The Kursk NPP is an important facility for us. A replacement power plant is being constructed, which is not only about the electric power generation – it’s also a contribution into innovative jobs and social support for the city of Kurchatov. If the company is growing, the city is being developed. I can see that the construction gathers momentum, the works are carried out 24/7. The team will be increased multiple times by the end of the year’, Roman Starovoyt noted. He mentioned that he appreciate the arrangement, according to which the contracting companies coming from other regions do register their affiliates on-site so that all tax incomes stay in the region.

‘This year’s investments from the Rosenergoatom Joint-Stock Company for the replacement power plant construction project only exceed 19 billion rubles. This is an enormous number, and it helps us both improve our ratings and expect high tax incomes, which means additional funding for social and cultural facilities across the Kursk Region’, the ad interim governor said.

Viacheslav Fedyukin, the director of the running Kursk NPP, familiarized Roman Starovoyt with the operation and the features of the main control unit. The latter is used for centralized automated management of the power block’s technological processes. One power block produces around 30 million rubles’ worth of electric power in 24 hours, and there are four blocks at the plant. This is why it is important to facilitate their stable and reliable operation, which is monitored 24/7 by the NPP’s team.

The head of the region also visited the radiation exposure screen where the main indicators of the NPP’s radiological state are analyzed in the real-time. The governor was also welcomed at the very heart of the NPP, that is, in the central hall of the fourth power block. Mr. Starovoyt highly appreciated the capacity of the turbine generators at the machine hall.

‘As of now, the Kursk NPP accounts for 96% of the region’s electric power plants designed capacity. 80% of the electric power output goes to the ‘Center’ energy grid catering to 19 regions of the Central Federal District’, Viacheslav Fedyukin explained. ‘All in all, since its launch, the Kursk NPP has produced over 919 billion kilowatt-hours. On that occasion, we are a runner-up among the Russian NPPs, as the Leningrad NPP that was launched two years earlier is ahead of us’.

The tour to the Kursk NPP continued with a visit to the construction site where the pilot 3_ generation power blocks are being erected following a VVER-TOI (typical optimized information-based water-water energy reactor) project. The Kursk NPP-2 is the biggest investment project in the region. Since the beginning of the Kursk NPP-2 construction, the total investments have exceeded 60 billion rubles.

The reactor building is now being constructed at the first power block’s nuclear island. In the meantime, the foundation plate of the second power block is now being concreted, with over three thousand cubic meters of concrete already placed.

‘It is strategically important for the Kursk Region and for the whole country to build replacement power plants with reactors of such kind. We need to put VVER-TOI reactors into operation to demonstrate the might of our nuclear power industry. This is what our traditions are about’, Roman Starovoyt added.