Romania Cancels Deal With China To Build Nuclear Reactors

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By Madalin Necsutu

The Romanian government on Tuesday asked the state company Nuclearelectrica, which runs the nuclear power plant in Cernavoda, to terminate negotiations with its Chinese partner China General Nuclear Power Corporation, GCNPC, on the construction of nuclear reactors 3 and 4 at Cernavoda. 

The government said Nuclearelectrica needs to find new partners for the project. A Memorandum of Understanding was signed between Nuclearelectrica and GCNPC in November 2015 to build the two reactors. 

According to the document, the two parties were to set up a joint venture project company in which the Chinese company would hold a stake of at least 51 per cent of the shares.

The new joint venture was planned to take over the value of Nuclearelectrica’s investment in its subsidiary EnergoNuclear SA, the former company that had been due to handle the project for reactors 3 and 4 at the Cernavoda plant. 

In May 2019, the Energy Ministry under the former Social Democratic Prime Minister Viorica Dancila signed another document with the Chinese company, concerning a 200-million-euros a year investment from GCNPC.

But the current Prime Minister, Ludovic Orban, condemned the deal in January 2020. “It is clear to me that it will not work with the Chinese … We will see with which partner [the reactors will be built]. It is about partners and funding,” Orban said in an interview for Hotnews. 

Economy Minister Virgil Popescu said in January 2020 that Nuclearelectrica could build reactor 3 at Cernavoda by itself, and added that a new joint project with a NATO partner was a more viable scenario. 

Romania is a close ally of the US and its movement away from key deals with Beijing has likely been affected by the dramatic cooling in US-China ties since Donald Trump took office in Washington.

In April 2016, the US Justice Department accused China General Nuclear Power Corporation along with Energy Technology International of nuclear espionage.

The US justified its accusation, citing “conspiracy to unlawfully engage and participate in the production and development of special nuclear material outside the United States, without the required authorization from the US Department of Energy”.

The Romanian Energy Ministry holds the majority share capital of 82.49 per cent of Nuclearelectrica, while Property Fund owns 7.05 per cent and other shareholders have 10.45 per cent. 

Nuclearelectrica shares registered an increase of 34.4 per cent on the Bucharest Stock Exchange since the beginning of 2020. The rise was linked to transactions worth 168.3 million lei [about 35 million euros.]

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The Balkan Insight (formerly the Balkin Investigative Reporting Network, BIRN) is a close group of editors and trainers that enables journalists in the region to produce in-depth analytical and investigative journalism on complex political, economic and social themes. BIRN emerged from the Balkan programme of the Institute for War & Peace Reporting, IWPR, in 2005. The original IWPR Balkans team was mandated to localise that programme and make it sustainable, in light of changing realities in the region and the maturity of the IWPR intervention. Since then, its work in publishing, media training and public debate activities has become synonymous with quality, reliability and impartiality. A fully-independent and local network, it is now developing as an efficient and self-sustainable regional institution to enhance the capacity for journalism that pushes for public debate on European-oriented political and economic reform.

One thought on “Romania Cancels Deal With China To Build Nuclear Reactors

  • May 29, 2020 at 7:33 pm
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    This is what happens when country is subservient to foreign overlords and cannot do what would benefit it’s people but needs to take a position in the fight that it has no stakes in.

    Reply

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