Iran able to design reactor to power ships, submarines: AEOI director

Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Director Fereydoun Abbasi has said that Iran is able to design the nuclear reactors needed to power the ships and submarines that it plans to equip with nuclear propulsion systems, Tehran Times reported.

"We have no special plan in this regard, but of course, we have the capability to design reactors to (power) vessels," Abbasi told reporters on Sunday when asked about a plan recently approved by the Majlis Industries and Mines Committee which calls for Iranian oceangoing tankers and other commercial ships to be powered by nuclear fuel in order to eliminate their need to be refueled while on long voyages.

The plan is said to be a response to the West's anti-Iranian sanctions. The parliament must endorse the plan before it can be implemented.

Abbasi said, "If need be and the government of the Islamic Republic makes a decision in this regard, and if it is the people's demand, we in the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran have no problem in pursuing this plan."

He also said that if Iran needs uranium enriched to a purity level of higher than 20 percent in order to fuel nuclear-powered ships and submarines, it will inform the International Atomic Energy Agency of its need so that the agency can facilitate the process of supplying the country with the required nuclear fuel.

At present, Iran has no intention of producing nuclear fuel enriched to a purity level higher than 20 percent, he added.

The deputy commander of the Iranian Navy has also announced that Iran plans to build nuclear-powered submarines.

In an interview with the Persian service of the Fars News Agency published on June 12, Rear Admiral Abbas Zamini said that the Iranian Navy is planning to design and manufacture nuclear-powered submarines, adding, "We are now in the early stages of the project to build nuclear submarines."