Atomflot expects tenders to be called for 2 nuclear icebreakers in Q1
ST. PETERSBURG. Dec 5 (Interfax) - Tenders to build two 60MW nuclear-powered icebreakers might be announced in the first quarter of 2013, the chief executive of state company Atomflot, Vyacheslav Ruksha told reporters Wednesday at the international forum The Arctic: Present and Future in St. Petersburg.
When the tenders are announced depends a great deal on the passage of the federal budget, he said.
Ruksha said it has not yet been decided whether there will be one tender for the construction of two icebreakers or if tenders will be held separately for the contracts for each ship. There will "probably be a separate contract for each icebreaker," he added.
The construction of the flagship icebreaker in the series is scheduled to begin in December 2017 and will take 2-2.5 years, Ruksha said. The first icebreaker is supposed to be commissioned in 2020 and the second in 2022.
Ruksha recalled that an icebreaker of this class (pre-serial) is already being built. Atomflot signed a contract to build the 60 MW icebreaker with LLC Baltiysky Zavod Shipbuilding in August 2012. It will cost 37 billion rubles. It is scheduled to be put on the stocks in November 2013 and floated in November 2015. Under the terms of the contract, the shipyard is supposed to build the icebreaker by December 30, 2017 and deliver it to Atomflot's dock in Murmansk.
Atomflot, a division of state corporation Rosatom, operates Russia's fleet of nuclear icebreakers, which currently numbers five active ships.