Russia’s Yugoria Group of Insurance Companies and the Orgenergostroy Institute Joint Stock Company have signed a RUB 33bn ($442m) insurance contract related to the construction of the MBIR multipurpose research reactor.
MBIR is being built at the Research Institute of Nuclear Reactors (NIIAR), part of the scientific division of Rosatom, in Dimitrovgrad, Ulyanovsk Region.
“The construction of the facility comes under the state programme “Development of the nuclear power industry complex”, commented Alexey Okhlopkov, General Director of the Yugoria Group abroad.
He added that the Orgenergostroy Institute “is our significant partner and we are certainly interested in long-term mutually beneficial cooperation”. In 2020, Orgenergostroy, as the general contractor for the project, began construction of main and auxiliary buildings and structures as part of the MBIR project.
MBIR is a sodium-cooled fast neutron multipurpose research reactor, “which will become the flagship for peaceful nuclear research not only domestically but internationally”, said Elguja Kokosadze, General Director of the Orgenergostroy Institute.
In 2020, at Rosatom’s initiative, the first consortium of companies in the nuclear industry was created based on the Association of Organisations of the Nuclear Industry Construction Complex (ASKAO), he explained. ASKAO not only consolidates the resources of its members, but also disseminates advanced Russian and foreign experience in organising construction and introducing innovative technologies and materials. Orgenergostroy was chosen to lead the consortium, which also includes the Yugoria Group of Insurance Companies.
The construction of the 150MWt MBIR began in 2015. It is expected to become the most powerful operating, built and designed research reactor in the world. Its unique technical characteristics will allow the reactor to be used for solving a wide range of scientific problems and research time using MBIR will be several times less compared with the currently operating research reactors.
“The implementation of the project is in an active stage: more than 650 people and more than 50 pieces of equipment have already been mobilised at the site, which, it should be noted, is ahead of the planned schedule. Orgenergostroy is proud that, together with its reliable partners, it is directly involved in the construction of such a significant and large-scale project,” Kokosadze added.
