Iran will send the first advance payment to Russia to finance the ongoing construction of the Bushehr-2 Nuclear Power Plant by the end of the year, an official site with the Russian manufacturing corporation said Monday.
Russian and Iranian nuclear officials signed a construction protocol at a Saturday ground-breaking ceremony marking the start of work on the Bushehr-2 in the southern Bushehr Province.
"This protocol specifies the terms of the start of work, taking into account the advance payments that Iran must make. The advance payment will be made by the end of the year, it will be paid in several tranches," Suren Ambartsumyan, a site leader with Russia’s Atomstroyexport foreign trade engineering firm, told reporters.
The Bushehr-2 project was rolled out by Russian nuclear experts in Tehran in 2014. Moscow and Tehran signed a deal to build the second and third reactors at the site in November that year, with an option of building six more in the future.
The cost of the Bushehr 2 project is estimated at $10 billion. Its implementation will take 10 years.
The new plants will boost Iran's total nuclear power output to more than 2,o00 megawatts. The second reactor will become operational in October 2024 and the third by April 2026, according to Russia's State Atomic Energy Corporation.
Iran says that the new Bushehr nuclear plant will reduce domestic oil consumption by 22 million barrels a year once it is fully operational.
