BAKU, Azerbaijan, January 13. The construction of the second and third units of the Bushehr nuclear power plant (NPP) in Bushehr province, southern Iran, is presently in progress, Iran's Vice President and Chairman of the Atomic Energy Organization Mohammad Eslami told reporters following a visit to the Bushehr nuclear power plant on January 13, Trend reports.
The current status of the physical execution within the two referenced units, he explained, stands at a completion rate of 17 percent.
Eslami pointed out that the nation's nuclear power plants are set to ramp up production to 3,000 megawatts by 2028, and the Atomic Energy Organization is pulling out all the stops to make this happen.
The official emphasized that the first unit of the Bushehr nuclear power plant has produced about 70 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity over the past 10 years. This has resulted in saving about 105 million barrels of crude oil in addition to preventing environmental pollution.
He added that Iran's Atomic Energy Organization has set a target to increase the share of nuclear power plants' production to 20,000 megawatts by 2041. Accordingly, work has been launched to build plants in different parts of the country, and each of them is currently at different stages.
In 2011, the first unit of Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant began operations. An Iranian company took over the unit's operation from Rosatom in 2013. Since 2013, this unit has generated the maximum amount of electricity—1,000 megawatt hours of electricity. Over the past 10 years, electricity generation at Bushehr NPP has exceeded 65 billion kilowatt-hours.
To note, construction of Bushehr NPP Blocks 2 and 3 began in 2017 on an area of 50 ha. Once operational, each of these units can generate 1,057 megawatts of electricity. The commissioning of these two units will save 10 million barrels of crude oil or 1.6 bcm of gas per year and prevent the release of 7 million tons of polluting gases into the environment.
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