Russia’s nuclear energy corporation Rosatom, together with the Hungarian customer, Paks II, is working on the project to build the new power units in accordance with the most stringent Hungarian and international safety requirements.
The Director-General of ROSATOM Alexey Likhachev held negotiations with Viktor Orbán, Prime Minister of Hungary and visited the construction site of the Paks-2 nuclear power plant (NPP), accompanied by Janos Süli, Minister responsible for the Paks-2 NPP project, Alexander Lokshin, President of ASE, Rosatom’s engineering company and Alexander Merten, Vice President of ASE and Director of the Paks NPP construction project.
The parties noted significant progress on the project in recent years, both in terms of documentation and licensing work and directly in terms of construction work during the preparatory period at the site of the new nuclear power plant. The two new units at Paks will start commercial operation in 2029-2030.
Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stressed during the talks that the two new power units under construction in Paks are a guarantee that Hungary will have affordable electricity in the required volume. Nuclear power will allow Hungary to keep energy tariffs low and, as a consequence, the public’s utility bills low. The Hungarian government welcomes the fact that an increasing number of countries recognise that, in addition to renewable energy sources, nuclear power must also be used in the long term, otherwise the environmental goal cannot be achieved.
Alexey Likhachev pointed out that in the context of the energy crisis in Europe, nuclear power plays a particularly important role in ensuring energy security, sustainable energy supply and maintaining the stability of energy tariffs. The head of Rosatom emphasised that the Russian nuclear industry, besides the construction of new power units, is ready to cooperate with Hungary and offer a wide range of other products.
The Paks II NPP project is being implemented on the basis of the Russian-Hungarian intergovernmental agreement of 14 January 2014. The Paks II NPP will be built on a turnkey basis, with Russia providing a preferential loan of 80 per cent of the total construction cost of the two new units, which amounts to 12.5 billion euros.