FNPPs are part of Rosatom’s recent vogue of dabbling in small nuclear energy and small nuclear power generators.
The chief argument used by proponents of such plants is the necessity of delivering electricity to remote regions of the country, these plants have a big future.
According to them, despite the fact that specific investments in various designs of such small plants exceeds by five times the amount invested in larger standard stations (of 1000 megawatts). Adherents of small nuclear energy consider that money does not bring happiness and that what is most important is to occupy the small nuclear energy niche, which they expect to bring good contracts, including international ones.
Currently, Rosatom plans to suggest floating nuclear power plants from places such as South Africa, the Far East, to South America and others to solve their power problems and difficulties with lack of fresh water.
Rosatom’s relationship to these initiatives is unambiguous. But how justified they are from the point of view of economics and all manner of safety issues – especially nuclear – remains unclear.
So far, the initiators of small nuclear energy in Russia have not been able to seriously necessity, the economic or energy related advisability, the reliability or the ultimate safety of the new craze of small nuclear energy projects.
The current Bellona report, available in Russian, is designed for the public, specialists, decision makers as well as potential FNPP clients.
Bellona attempts lay out all of the problematic issues of FNPPs in this new report. At the same time, Bellona does not in this report return to or describe those events that have taken place witin the creation of floating nuclear power plants up to the year 2000 because they are already described in the brochure “Floating Nuclear Power Plants: A Threat to the Arctic, World Oceans and Nonproliferation,” which was published with Bellona’s participation in 2000.