New Delhi (Sputnik) — India, Russia, and Bangladesh on Thursday signed a memorandum of agreement for cooperation in the construction of Bangladesh's first nuclear power plant. The nuclear power plant (NPP) at Rooppur will be built by Russia's State Atomic Energy Corporation Rosatom and the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL) will assist in construction, installation and infrastructure assignments for the project.
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The memorandum was signed by Deputy Director General for International Relations of Rosatom Nikolay Spassky, Ambassador of Bangladesh in the Russian Federation S. M. Saiful Hoque and the Ambassador of India in the Russian Federation Pankaj Saran.
"Today was a landmark event for our countries and the industry as a whole. We are confident that this is the first step toward the formation of a new, forward-looking cooperation agenda in the region," Nikolay Spassky said after the signing of the agreement.
Rosatom said it is open to cooperation in the framework of its projects and that the signing of the memorandum was another illustration of their approach.
While Russia will implement designing, manufacturing, and supply of the equipment, construction, erection, start-up, and adjustment, commissioning, India will provide the personnel training, consultation support and participate in the construction and erection activity and non-critical materials supply to the site in Bangladesh.
In September 2017, during the 61st general conference of the global nuclear watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), India's Atomic Energy Commission chairman Sekhar Basu announced India's intention to collaborate with Russia on Bangladesh's Rooppur NPP without divulging the details.
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The Rooppur NPP will consist of two power units with Russian-designed WWER reactors with a capacity of 1,200 MW each. The units constructed as per this project are related to the nuclear units of the "3+" generation with improved technical and economic indicators and the most modern reliability and safety requirements. Power unit No. 1 of the Russian Novovoronezh NPP-2 became the reference for the Rooppur NPP. The site of the Rooppur NPP is located on the bank of the Padma River in the Rooppur settlement in the district of Pabna, about 160 kilometers from the Dhaka.
