TENEX could agree on first supplies of Japanese regenerated uranium by end-2012
MOSCOW. March 27 (Interfax) - Russian nuclear materials exporter OJSC Techsnabexport (TENEX) expects to reach agreements on the first supplies of Japanese regenerated uranium for enrichment in Russia by the end of 2012.
"I think that theoretically, if not a signing of the first regenerated uranium contracts, then we could at least reach a fixation of their main parameters and conditions," head of TENEX subsidiary Tenex-Japan Sergei Pluzhnik told Interfax in an interview.
Pluzhnik was referring to enrichment in Russia of Japanese energy company-owned regenerated uranium stored in Europe - the regenerated uranium project.
Negotiations and consultations on the regenerated uranium project have never stopped. "Fukushima resulted in several adjustments being made to the timetable for this project, but the project itself is alive, and continuous work is being carried out on it," Pluzhnik said.
The project's implementation was previously hindered by the lack of an acting intergovernmental agreement between Russia and Japan on the peaceful use of nuclear energy. The document was signed in 2009 and ratified by the two countries' parliaments in 2011.
The two countries are expected to exchange notes at the beginning of April, and the intergovernmental agreement will enter into force a month later. "In all likelihood, we will have an acting intergovernmental agreement by the beginning of May," Pluzhnik said.
Last week, head of Rosatom Sergei Kiriyenko said that he will be visiting Japan in April and that Japanese companies are showing a high level of interest in enriching their regenerated uranium in Russia.