Westinghouse, Metrostav to sign cooperation agreement on Temelin

A similar agreement was signed by Westinghouse and Czech engineering companies Vitkovice and I&C Energo.

Other firms bidding for Temelin´s completion are Czech company Skoda JS in a consortium with Russian firms Atomstroyexport and Gidropress and France´s Areva.

Bids are to be submitted in mid-2012. Decision on the winner of the tender will be made next year. Temelin´s unit three and four are to be completed in the year 2025 at the latest.

The bidders have recently received the tender documents from power producer CEZ, which operates the nuclear facility in the south of Bohemia near the Austrian border.

Rosatom, whose member is Atomstroyexport, signed several future cooperation agreements with Czech companies last year, among them Vitkovice and Hochtief.

Areva will sign these agreements in the first quarter of this year.

The price of the two new blocks at Temelin is put at around Kc150bn. CEZ should use its own resources to finance Temelin´s expansion. But, its representatives have repeatedly said in the recent months that the firm is considering asking a new partner to join the project.

Vaclav Bartuska, the Czech energy ambassador overseeing the Temelin tender, said the project would depend a lot on the EU´s economic development. "I expect that CEZ will have to secure the money for Temelin 3 and 4 itself. It will be hard to find a strong partner willing to sell himself to such a long-term project," Bartuska told CTK.

Author: ČTK
www.ctk.cz