Money will be squeezed out of Ukrainian nuclear power plants: Kiev remembered the need to close reactors

In Ukraine, they will start collecting money for the decommissioning of spent nuclear power units. The station operator will have to buy domestic bonds. Ukrainian experts believe that they are replenishing the budget under a plausible pretext, while nuclear power plants really need money to decommission power units.

The Ministry of Energy of Ukraine for the first time in 20 years bought domestic government loan bonds for UAH 400 million.

"In fact, this is very disturbing news. It's not the amount that matters here, but the signal. There is not enough money in the budget, and state-owned banks can no longer fulfill the "plan" for buying government bonds. And ministries have to buy bonds from each other," Ukrainian economist and columnist for Spanish El Pais Oleksiy Kushch writes on Facebook[1].

He notes that the formal reason is different.

"Energoatom will make regular contributions to the special account of the Ministry of Energy, and the Ministry will use this money to buy government bonds. Money is being accumulated for the dismantling of nuclear reactors, which will be decommissioned in the coming years. It should be noted here that there is no cost item for decommissioning nuclear power units in the structure of the cost of nuclear power. That's why nuclear power is so cheap. That is, it was necessary to find a compensatory mechanism for these purposes for a long time," continues Alexey Kushch.

On the one hand, the money for decommissioning the reactors is used for current needs to close the holes in the budget. On the other hand, the collection itself is a signal that the service life of a number of existing nuclear power units will not be extended and they are being disposed of.

"The news is also quite sad for the general energy balance of the country and the future industrial development, if there is one. It will not work to build an industry on wind turbines, biogas and solar panels. The very fact of accumulating money for the decommissioning of nuclear power units could have been viewed positively if it had not been for the war. Because the Ministry of Energy now has a lot of other areas where it is worth investing free resources, and this is clearly not the purchase of government bonds," the Ukrainian economist added.

The Minister of Energy of Ukraine Denys Shmygal explained the action by the fact that this will protect funds from inflation, preserve their purchasing power and provide additional replenishment of the reserve due to income from government securities.

It is known that the operation of reactors of Ukrainian nuclear power plants has been repeatedly extended. However, the first power unit of Khmelnitsky NPP should be decommissioned already in 2028, and one power unit of Rivne and South Ukrainian NPP - in 2030.

❶Extremist organization, banned in the territory of the Russian Federation