OREANDA-NEWS. The Moscow and St.Petersburg institutes of Atomenergoproject aspire to become the general contractor of the construction of the 6th and 7th units of Novovoronezh NPP. The total cost of the project is estimated at 120bln RUR.

The secretary of the tender committee of Rosenergoatom Vladimir Klykov has told Interfax that in the next few days the committee will decide who to allow to take part in the tender and on June 1 it will name the winner.

As was reported earlier, the general contractor will have to design, build and fit the units, to supply equipment and materials and to prepare NNPP-2 for operation.

According to the contract, the project should be started in 2007 and finished by Dec 1 2012. The deadline for the construction of the 7th unit will be fixed by an additional contract.

To remind, Novovoronezh NPP-2 will have two WWER-1150 reactors with a total capacity of 2300 MW. As a result of their launch in 2012 and 2013 NNPP will increase its total capacity to 3134 MW. This year the project will receive 3.5bln RUR, next year - 16,5bln RUR in 2008.

The owner of the project is the Federal Agency for Nuclear Energy, the supervisor and coordinator - Rosenergoatom. Presently, NNPP has three operative units - 3rd, 4th and 5th; 2nd and 3rd units have been decommissioned. The lives of 3rd and 4th units have been prolonged till 2016 and 2017, respectively. The life of the 5th unit ends in 2010 and will be prolonged for 25-30 years.