El Dabaa NPP Project to Further 'Anchor’ Russia-Egypt Ties

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Egyptian counterpart Abdel Fattah el-Sisi have led a ceremony by video link to pour the first batch of concrete for the fourth unit of the El-Dabaa nuclear power plant. The country's first NPP is being built with the participation of Russia's state nuclear corporation Rosatom.

Large-scale, critically-important infrastructure projects like Egypt’s El-Dabaa nuclear power plant (NPP) can become an ‘anchor’ in bilateral relations, Anton Khlopkov, founder and Director of the Russian Center for Energy and Security Studies (CENESS) think tank, told Sputnik.

The construction of the expansive project encompassing four nuclear reactors, each with a 1.2-gigawatt capacity, "will span 5-10 years," he said. The nuclear power plant should have a service life of sixty years with a possible extension for another twenty.

“Accordingly, the two countries can be expected to closely interact on the NPP’s running, maintenance and fuel supplies throughout these 80 years. At the same time, the scale of the project is colossal in terms of financing, the amount of energy to be produced. Therefore, I would venture to suggest that in the long term this particular project can become an ‘anchor’ around which other areas of interaction can develop,” said Khlopkov.

Earlier on Tuesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Sisi launched the construction of the fourth unit of the Dabaa nuclear power plant in Egypt via video conference. Pouring the first layer of concrete in the foundations of the building set to house the nuclear reactor marked the start of the construction of the new unit. All four units of the plant will be built simultaneously, with the NPP achieving full operational capacity by 2030.

Russia and Egypt signed an intergovernmental agreement on the construction of the Dabaa NPP in the Matrouch governorate on the Mediterranean coast in November 2015. Set to become the largest construction project carried out by Moscow and Cairo since the Aswan Dam, it is a collaboration between Russia's Rosatom state nuclear energy corporation and Egypt's Nuclear Power Plants Authority (NPPA).

Construction of the plant began on July 20, 2022. The future nuclear power plant will include four power units with Russian-made VVER-1200 reactors, which meet the highest international efficiency and safety requirements. The total installed electric capacity of the plant will be nearly 4.8 GW. Egypt will become the only country in the region with generation 3+ reactors.

Under the deal, Russia will be responsible for building the nuclear power plant, supplying nuclear fuel for its entire life cycle, providing assistance in training local personnel and support for the nuclear facility's operation for the first 10 years of its operation and carrying out maintenance.

Egypt has repeatedly touted the El Dabaa NPP project as a key element of its sustainable development strategy, boosting the reliability of the national energy supply system and meeting the growing demand for electricity from its economy and industry.

West’s Efforts to Sideline Russia Failed

The El Dabaa nuclear power plant offers further confirmation that Russia’s developments in the field of nuclear energy are highly sought-after, Khlopkov noted. Further proof of was the “continued attempts by Western countries to unite their efforts in order to oust the Russian nuclear industry from world markets,” he said, who is also Editor-in-Chief of the Nuclear Club journal of CENESS.

Those moves followed sweeping sanctions on Russia's energy sector following Moscow's special operation in Ukraine. The EU's embargo on Russian fossil fuels has backfired on the bloc, accelerating already-soaring prices and inflation. Europeans have been forced to replace Russia's relatively cheap pipeline gas with US liquified natural gas (LNG) and reduce the fuel consumption. Any move to sever Europe's ties with Rosatom spearheaded by the G7 could lead to unintended consequences, pundits told Sputnik last year.

At last year’s Group of Seven (G7) summit a decision was taken to create a special nuclear supply chain in order to try to sideline Russia while “reshaping the international nuclear fuel trade.” The civil nuclear fuel security agreement announced in April on the sidelines of the G7 Ministers’ Meeting on Climate, Energy and Environment in Japan envisioned cooperation between Canada, France, Japan, the UK, and the US to “recognize and leverage the unique resources and capabilities possessed by each country’s civil nuclear sectors to establish a global commercial nuclear fuel market.”

“Western countries, as well as Japan in recent years, have not built nuclear power plants, be it on their own territory or abroad, so they have lost many core competencies and expertise. Russia, on the contrary, is now implementing a number of projects abroad besides Egypt’s [El-Dabaa NPP]. One can name Turkiye, Iran, India, China, Bangladesh, Belarus, and so on down the list,” stressed the expert.

Further attempts to banish Russia from these markets, including through the Western-favored mechanism of sanctions are to be expected, noted Khlopkov. He added that such efforts are unlikely to succeed as Western countries have practically no viable alternatives to offer.

Egypt’s El-Dabaa NPP is noteworthy noteworthy as the project's subcontractors not only include Egyptian firms but the likes of Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power (KHNP) company. A subsidiary of the Korea Electric Power Corporation (KEPCO), it operates large nuclear and hydroelectric plants in South Korea.

Despite Western sanctions, South Korea continues to work on the project a with Russian participation. In the case of South Korea the country’s companies do not have as many external orders as their existing production infrastructure allows them to produce equipment for, Anton Khlopkov suggested. On the other hand, “one has to bear in mind that such cooperation in the current conditions makes a project more vulnerable.”

“It is no secret that, first of all, Washington has been trying for many years now to work with subcontractors of the Russian nuclear industry with the aim of either slowing down the relevant projects, or their stopping them altogether,” said the expert.

Khlopkov recalled that when the first unit of Iran's Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant was being built, Washington actively pressured Ukraine to force national firm Turboatom to withdraw from the project, and accomplished this goal. “I hope that the South Korean side will fully fulfill its obligations under the [El-Dabaa NPP] project. But to be honest, I'm not sure,” he said, adding:

“While there is certainly someone to replace them, should the South Korean side opt out under US pressure, but the implementation of the project could be delayed for three or four years.”

The concrete-pouring ceremony was an important step towards realizing the Egyptian nuclear dream, Deputy Secretary of the Energy Committee of the Egyptian House of Representatives Dr. Mohammad Junaidi told Sputnik.

“Today’s ceremony confirms that the once-distant plans for the project are finally being realized right before our eyes. Egypt will soon reap the benefits of the implementation of the nuclear project, which is a step within the framework of the Egypt “Vision 2030” objective. We are seeing serious progress in the development of the El Dabaa NPP, and the project is on schedule. All indicators confirm that the first nuclear reactors within the El Dabaa project will be commissioned in 2028,” said Dr. Junaidi, adding that his country highly valued cooperation with Russia based on “mutual benefit for both sides."