Mr Vasilev said Kozlduy, on the Danuber River in northwest Bulgaria, has a ready site with a completed environmental impact assessment and an “assembled team.”
He said if Bulgaria starts work on a new unit this year, it could be ready between 2028 and 2030. He also mentioned the possibility of deploying a second new reactor unit at Kozloduy.
Bulgaria has two Russia-made VVER-1000 pressurised water reactor units in commercial operation at Kozloduy. The two plants, inherited from the socialist era, provide about a third of the country’s electricity.
Sofia has considered the option of building new nuclear reactors at one of two sites, the existing Kozloduy nuclear station and a proposed new site at Belene, a project with a long history of suspensions and restarts.
Belene was likely to be built by Russian state nuclear corporation Rosatom after the bulk of the nuclear island equipment had already been manufactured and delivered under a 2016 international arbitration settled by Bulgaria for €600m. The arbitration resulted from the 2012 cancellation of the project over financing concerns.
In February, Bulgaria’s prime minister Kiril Petkov said his government did not intend to build new units at Belene and would like to focus on new-build at Kozloduy, comments which sparked criticism from his socialist coalition partners. However, since the Belene project was revived in 2018, Bulgaria has failed to find investors in the project.
Officially, a December 2021 government coalition agreement calls for an “independent expert analysis” to assess the need for new nuclear based on economic feasibility, cost and construction timeframe. This analysis has not been published to date.
It remains unclear what technology would be put forward for a new Kozloduy unit. In 2012, US-based Westinghouse Electric offered its AP1000 pressurised water reactor design for a Kozloduy expansion. Other voices locally are calling for deploying the Russia-procured Belene equipment for use at Kozloduy.
Last month, Mr Vasilev said the government had begun negotiations with Greece for the potential construction of a new nuclear power station in Bulgaria.
The new nuclear would supply power to both countries, guarantee a long-term buyer for the electricity produced and reduce the business risk associated with the project, he said.
