Permission has been granted to the Astravo nuclear power plant to start generating electricity in the first unit

This decision was made after examining the documents of the tests carried out and concluding that the power plant is safe to start and is ready to start producing electricity.

In August, Gosatomnadzor changed the licensing procedure for the Astravo nuclear power plant: licenses will be issued separately for each main stage, based on the readiness assessment. Until then, it was planned to issue a general operating license.

The first nuclear power plant in Belarus to be built near the Lithuanian state will have two reactors from the Russian VVER project, each with a capacity of 1,200 megawatts.

Minsk has announced that the loading of nuclear fuel in the first reactor will be completed on August 20, when it is turned on, a controlled minimum level of 1% will be reached. power, and will start generating electricity in November. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has said it should happen on November 7.

The first reactor is scheduled to go into industrial operation in the first quarter of 2021. The second reactor is expected to start up approximately one year after the start of the first reactor.

Lithuania is the biggest critic of the power plant being built in Belarus, while Minsk rejects Vilnius’ accusations of non-compliance with safety requirements.

At that time, the European Parliament (EP) on Wednesday adopted recommendations to the Council of the European Union (EU) calling for the postponement of the start of operations at the Astrava nuclear power plant.

Recommendations on how the EU should shape its policy towards Belarus were approved by 602 members of the European Parliament, 44 were rejected and abstained, according to the EP office in Lithuania.

Among other calls, the recommendations emphasize that the EU should be “seriously concerned” about the Astrava nuclear power plant and demand that it be postponed until all international nuclear safety recommendations have been implemented and the volatile situation in Belarus has ended. MEPs call for “support for European solidarity efforts” to ban the import of energy from the Astravo nuclear power plant in the EU market.

For the third consecutive month, Belarus has protested against Lukashenko, who was officially declared the winner of the presidential elections on August 9. The opposition and western democracies consider these elections to be rigged. Western countries have imposed sanctions on those responsible for electoral fraud and violence against protesters.