The Kaliningrad Nuclear Power Plant (also referred as Baltic Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) or Baltiiskaya NPP, ) is a

nuclear power plant A nuclear power plant (NPP), also known as a nuclear power station (NPS), nuclear generating station (NGS) or atomic power station (APS) is a thermal power station in which the heat source is a nuclear reactor. As is typical of thermal power st ...

which was under construction south-east of

Neman Neman, Nemunas or Niemen is a river in Europe that rises in central Belarus and flows through Lithuania then forms Lithuania–Russia border, the northern border of Kaliningrad Oblast, Russia's western exclave, which specifically follows its s ...

, in

Kaliningrad Oblast Kaliningrad Oblast () is the westernmost federal subjects of Russia, federal subject of the Russian Federation. It is a Enclave and exclave, semi-exclave on the Baltic Sea within the Baltic region of Prussia (region), Prussia, surrounded by Pola ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

. It was seen as a counter-project to the (later scrapped) plan to build the

Visaginas nuclear power plant Visaginas Nuclear Power Plant was a planned nuclear power plant project in Lithuania. It was proposed to be built at the site of the closed Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant, which was shut down on 31 December 2009 in accordance with Lithuania' ...

Lithuania Lithuania, officially the Republic of Lithuania, is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea, bordered by Latvia to the north, Belarus to the east and south, P ...

and was considered not only as an energy, but also as a geopolitical project. Originally intending to commission the reactors in 2016 and 2018, construction was temporarily stopped in June 2013 for the project to be redesigned for lower power output after neighbouring countries showed no interest in importing its electricity. However, the downgrade was later discarded. No export partners materialised as of 2021 and the project remains in stand-by.

Motivation

The excess electricity was planned to be exported into the EU market. According to Sergey Boyarkin, deputy general director of

Rosenergoatom Rosenergoatom () is the Russian nuclear power station operations subsidiary of Atomenergoprom. Ownership and formation The company was established on 7 September 1992 in Presidential decree 1055: "On operating organization of nuclear power plan ...

, the first reactor would be sufficient for Kaliningrad Oblast's needs, while electricity produced by the second reactor would be exported when not filling gaps in generation caused by refuelling and downtime. Lithuania, Poland and Germany were named as potential export markets. Sergey Boyarkin said that the shutdown of

Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant The Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant () is a Nuclear decommissioning, decommissioned two-unit RBMK-1500 nuclear power plant, nuclear power station in Visaginas Municipality, Lithuania. It was named after the nearby city of Ignalina. Due to the plant' ...

combined with

Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Polish people, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken * Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin ...

plans to scrap coal-fired generation in compliance with environmental regulation meant that the Baltic region faced an energy crisis by 2015. He also said that Kaliningrad Oblast would be isolated from electricity supplies from Russia if the Baltic states de-synchronized themselves from the

Russian electricity grid The IPS/UPS (), also widely known as the Russian grid is a wide area synchronous transmission grid, the Russian Unified Power System (UPS; ) and the Integrated Power System (IPS; ) portion of the network being the national networks of Azerbaij ...

and joined the

synchronous grid of Continental Europe The Continental Europe Synchronous Area (CESA), formerly known as the UCTE grid, is one of the largest synchronous electrical grids in the world, primarily operating in Europe. It is interconnected as a single phase-locked mains frequency el ...

(which they did in 2025). He also mentioned technical complications and unreliability in electricity transfer from

Smolensk Nuclear Power Plant Smolensk Nuclear Power Plant ( []) is a nuclear power station in Russia. It is located in Smolensk Oblast, in the town of Desnogorsk, approximately from Smolensk, from Bryansk and from Moscow. Smolensk Nuclear Power Plant is the biggest power ...

, which was the main supplier of Kaliningrad Oblast, via Belarus and Lithuania. On the other hand, the project was seen as a counter-project to the Visaginas nuclear power plant project in Lithuania. Russia invited Lithuania to participate in the project, instead of building the nuclear power plant in Lithuania.

History

A framework construction agreement was signed between the head of

Rosatom State Atomic Energy Corporation Rosatom (commonly referred to as Rosatom rus, Росатом, p=rosˈatəm}), also known as Rosatom State Nuclear Energy Corporation, (), or Rosatom State Corporation, is a Russian State corporation (Russia), sta ...

Sergei Kiriyenko Sergey Vladilenovich Kiriyenko (''Birth name, né'' ''Izraitel''; ; born 26 July 1962) is a Russian politician who has served as First Deputy Chief of Staff of the Presidential Administration of Russia since 5 October 2016. He previously served ...

and Governor of Kaliningrad Oblast Georgy Boos on 16 April 2008. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin signed the order for construction of the 2,300 MW plant in September 2009. Ground preparation works started on 25 February 2010. The first concrete was scheduled to be laid in April 2011, but was delayed until February 2012. On 4 June 2013, an order of Atomenergoproject, dated 30 May 2013 and published on 4 June 2013, ordered a series of staffing and budgeting overhauls "in connection with the mothballing of the Baltic NPP and NIAEP budget adjustments for 2013." It was later said that the project would be temporary stopped to reconsider the project's design in case there would be no export to the European Union. On 4 July 2013,

Sergey Kiriyenko Sergey Vladilenovich Kiriyenko (''né'' ''Izraitel''; ; born 26 July 1962) is a Russian politician who has served as First Deputy Chief of Staff of the Presidential Administration of Russia since 5 October 2016. He previously served as the 30th ...

, head of Rosatom, announced that both units would be built like previously planned, with two VVER-1200 and no smaller reactor.

Technical features

The original design had foreseen two VVER-1200/491 pressurized water reactors in an AES-2006 standard design configuration. The reactors have a capacity of 1150 MWe each and would be supplied by

Atomstroyexport Atomstroyexport (ASE) JSC () is the Russian Federation's nuclear power equipment and service exporter. It is a fully owned subsidiary of Rosatom. Organization Atomstroyexport, along with Atomenergoprom, is part of Rosatom's ''Engineering Divi ...

. The first reactor was planned to be operational by 2017 and the second reactor by 2018. Cost was expected to be around €6.8 billion (US$8.8 billion) Two further reactors could be added in the future depending on economic development in Kaliningrad and in the Baltic region in general. The redesigned plan would have consisted of two reactors of 640 MW (VVER-640) and 40 MW ( KLT-40S) capacity. An alternative foresaw up to eight 40 MW reactors.

Project development

The project was developed by Rosatom's subsidiary

Inter RAO UES Joint Stock Company Inter RAO UES (, short form: Inter RAO), traded as, is a diversified energy holding company headquartered in Moscow, Russia. Its business includes power and heat generation, electricity supply, international energy trading, e ...

. According to Rosatom, 49% of shares in the project would have been offered to European companies. This would have been the first Russian nuclear power plant with foreign participation. Potential investors named in this context were ČEZ,

Enel Enel S.p.A. is an Italian multinational manufacturer and distributor of electricity and gas. Enel was first established as a public body at the end of 1962, and then transformed into a limited company in 1992. In 1999, following the liberali ...

, and

Iberdrola Iberdrola, S.A. () is a Spanish multinational electric utility company based in Bilbao, Spain. It has around 40,000 employees and serves around 30 million customers. Subsidiary, Subsidiaries include ScottishPower (United Kingdom), Ava ...

. However no foreign partner joined the project.

References

External links