Energy Ministry of Armenia:  Nuclear Power Plant of Armenia to be taken offline in September for regularly scheduled maintenance

ArmInfo. Deputy Minister of Energy and Natural Resources of Armenia told ArmInfo the nuclear power plant (NPP) will be taken offline in September for regularly scheduled maintenance. 

He said standard procedures will be carried out within the two months of the plant's suspension. In addition, under the Lifetime Extension Project of unit No.2 of the Armenian NPP, a complex of measures will be taken to probe the state of the reactor vessel and the equipment of the primary coolant equipment of the nuclear island. Afterwards, the modernization project will undergo changes basing on the accurate data on the state of the equipment, metal, management system pipelines and many others, Areg Galstyan said.

Earlier, Gera Sevikyan, Deputy Director of Armenian NPP CJSC, told ArmInfo the NPP will be taken offline for scheduled refueling and maintenance in the period from September 19 through November 18 2016. In his words, a huge work will be carried out at the plant so that it could generate by 200 kWh more electric power per year in the future without additional expenses on fuel. This will reduce the cost value of the generated electric power and relieve the loan debt burden, Sevikyan said. 

In March 2014, the Government adopted a decision to extend the lifetime of the unit No.2 of the NPP in view of the delay with the construction of the new power unit.  At the current stage, the Lifetime Extension Project of unit No.2 of Armenian NPP is being implemented with the participation of Rusatom Service's specialists. The NPP will be modernized at the expense of the Russian  $270 mln loan and the Russian $30 mln grant funds.  The project will be implemented by the late 2019.