The construction of new reactors at Kozloduy remains a strategic bilateral priority.

The new board of directors of Kozloduy NPP-New Build has held official talks with the chargé d'affaires of the United States Embassy in Bulgaria, Martin Mekdauel, confirming that the project to build two new nuclear blocks remains a key strategic priority in the bilateral cooperation between the two countries.

The meeting followed shortly after the new Bulgarian Prime Minister Rumen Radev also met with the leadership of the American company Westinghouse. The main topics of the talks were progress in engineering preparations, construction timeframes, assessment of the final cost of the project, and financing possibilities through American export banks.

Replacement of old capacity and transition to American technology

The project foresees the construction of Blocks 7 and 8 at the Kozloduy Nuclear Power Plant, which will use American AP1000 pressurized-water reactor technology from Westinghouse. It is planned that Block 7 will be commissioned in 2035, while Block 8 is expected to come online in 2037.

The total installed capacity of these two new blocks will be 2300 megawatts, which will more than make up for the 1760-megawatt capacity lost by closing the old blocks 1 to 4 (VVER-440 models whose shutdown was a condition of the European Commission for Bulgaria's entry into the European Union in 2007).

Two active blocks (Blocks 5 and 6, both VVER-1000 design) currently generate about one third of Bulgaria's total electricity. Their operating life has been extended to 60 years, but the government in Sofia is already planning additional capacities that would replace them by 2050.

For the realization of the project, in November 2024 an engineering contract was signed with the South Korean company Hyundai Engineering & Construction and Westinghouse, while at the end of last year a Canadian consortium (Laurentis Energy Partners and BWXT Canada) was also engaged for the Owner’s Engineer services. The financial structure is supported by the American bank Citi.

In addition to the construction of large AP1000 reactors at the Kozloduy site, the Bulgarian government is also considering the possibility of introducing small modular reactors (SMR) into the national energy system.

S.A.