Can secure Nuclear Tech Straddle Russian Tensions?

Bulgaria is making an attempt to make use of new tech to map a path between Putin and the West.

January 9, 2015

Nuclear manufacturer Westinghouse electrical Co. claims that its new nuclear reactor is the safest on the planet. The AP-1000 boasts a design that’s nearly human error-proof, one of the vital largest promoting points for its construction in the city of Kozlodui, Bulgaria. however now this futuristic know-how faces prerequisites it wasn’t designed to resist: tremors along geopolitical fault traces between Russia and the West.

Nuclear energy is all the time a political problem, especially so on this eastern European us of a of seven million with a protracted history of straddling uncomfortably between powers. Westinghouse is an American corporate giant, and things have been particularly unpleasant today between the U.S. and Russia: in March, Vladimir Putin annexed parts of Ukraine. In December, falling oil costs and western sanctions decimated the Russian ruble. it is, relying on whose calculations, a smart time or a horrible time for Bulgaria to be asserting a degree of energy independence. The linchpin to that discussion is, arguably, the security claims of the AP-one thousand.

AP1000 Passive Containment Cooling device

“as far as i am mindful, the American know-how AP-one thousand is the safest in the world,” says Alexander Nikolov, the deputy director of the getting old Soviet-designed Kozlodui nuclear power plant which Bulgaria hopes to revive with this mission. Nuclear security is a controversial issue in Europe, and the E.U. compelled Bulgaria to close down Kozlodui’s oldest and most inclined four reactors previous to admitting it as a member in 2007. The power has risen after the 2011 Fukushima disaster in Japan. the unique working terms of Bulgaria’s remaining two reactors are set to expire in the subsequent decade, and supporters of the plant, who see it as a source of both national delight and low cost electricity, are excited by its future. Many additionally level to the fact that widespread protests over the associated fee of electricity toppled the federal government in 2013, triggering a protracted length of political instability.

Some observers question the commercial common sense of this argument. “i have never viewed yet a forecast for the growth of electricity consumption in Bulgaria which would justify building an additional [electricity-generating] capacity,” says Ruslan Stefanov, a senior economic analyst on the Sofia-based totally thinktank middle for the learn about of Democracy. He believes that it might make more sense for Bulgaria to focal point instead on making improvements to its current power infrastructure and the reasonably low power effectivity of its industries.

The transfer toward an American plant has been a long time coming. When it first opened in 1974, Kozlodui used to be the first nuclear power plant in Soviet-dominated Southeast Europe, a testomony to the usa’s standing as the U.S.’s most loyal satellite. Now Bulgaria is a member of each the E.U. and NATO, but Russia is not ready to surrender its influence right here—an influence nonetheless so strong that Western leaders nonetheless once in a while fear Bulgaria may turn out as a professional-Russian “malicious program.”

Western analysts charge that the Kremlin is the use of a complex subversive way to infiltrate jap Europe, primarily a mix of financial mushy energy, media spin and aggressive dating of numerous political groups—some as far apart as the a long way left and the a long way proper. vitality politics is a huge phase in it: Bulgaria, like most of its neighbors, imports most of its oil and gas from Russia.

however Russia’s alleged plans are simplest half of the story. The U.S. and the E.U. have additionally helped flip power in this part of the sector right into a “geopolitical football” by using aggressively interfering into the plans of different nations to build massive power infrastructure projects—now not simply nukes but gasoline and oil pipelines, too.

probably the most recent example of this was once the South move gasoline pipeline, which used to be projected to hold 63 billion cubic meters of Russian fuel a yr to Bulgaria, Serbia, Hungary, Austria and Italy. Alarmed by means of occasions in Ukraine and in search of to curb Russian influence, the U.S. and the E.U. pushed back against the mission and compelled Bulgaria to suspend work on it in June, citing anti-monopoly rules. Many Bulgarians saw this resolution as unfairly victimizing them. Then on December 1 Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that he used to be terminating the venture, essentially blaming Bulgaria for his determination. This shook the fragile grip on power of the just lately elected professional-Western govt in Sofia.

Caught up in a tug-of-conflict between rival overseas powers, as well as within the cut up sympathies of their voters, successive Bulgarian governments have sought creative the way to hedge their overseas policy commitments. “there is a fairly crude good judgment at play right here, aiming to create a steadiness in [Bulgaria’s] foreign coverage,” says Dimitar Bechev, an jap Europe knowledgeable on the London college of Economics. “The purpose is to give the Russians some [big energy projects] and at the similar time to purchase American reinforce by means of giving them something as smartly.”

Western Europe needs to be certain about security. right through commonplace operations, the AP-1000 works very similar to any other pressurized water reactor, via boiling water and spinning generators. In times of situation, then again, blind natural forces similar to gravity, convection and gas drive take over: valves open and shut on their own; water from overhead tanks floods vital areas and gases that may explode are let out. in keeping with Westinghouse, zero operator help or external energy is required for the primary 72 hours following a breakdown of standard operations, all over which period the reactor basically shuts itself down.

Nikolov says that big international banks similar to Citibank are keen to participate in the financing. He doesn’t say, alternatively, on what phrases. And the brand new Bulgarian government, though it is considered as professional-Western, may be very in need of dollars: the scores agency usual & bad’s just cut the us of a’s credit standing to junk. top Minister Boiko Borisov, paradoxically the identical man who resigned in electrical energy protests in 2013, has said that he is in search of buyers with a purpose to proceed. a new chance at energy independence is at all times a chance at redemption.

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