ReutersBangladesh is set to activate its first nuclear power plant in Rooppur, which is expected to ease electricity shortages.
Pabna: Bangladesh is preparing to switch on its first nuclear power plant, a long-delayed project promising relief from chronic electricity shortages -- even as some fear living beside it.The 2.4-gigawatt Rooppur nuclear plant, a $13-billion project more than a decade in the making, has transformed the once sleepy nearby village of the same name, bringing Russian workers, new businesses and jobs.Once fully operational, its two reactors are expected to supply more than 10 percent of electricity demand in the South Asian nation of 170 million people, which has been hit hard by the fuel crisis sparked by the conflict in the Middle East.For Md Zahedul Hasan, managing director of state-owned Nuclear Power Plant Company Bangladesh, the giant complex represents the culmination of a decades-old ambition to bring nuclear power to the country.The plant's first reactor is scheduled to be turned on by the end of this year, and the second unit "will be operational within a year", Hasan said at the site on the banks of the Padma River, 150 kilometres (93 miles) west of Dhaka.Live EventsBangladesh's power sector is dominated by fossil fuels, particularly natural gas, with coal, oil and renewables making up the rest.- 'Changed me' -The project, built with Russian state nuclear corporation Rosatom, has also brought an unlikely Russian enclave to rural Bangladesh.Thousands of Russian workers have spent years building and installing equipment, with a residential complex, shops and restaurants springing up around them.Shop signs appear in Bangla, English and Russian, while some restaurants serve borscht soup alongside local dishes.Alexander Vladimirovich Skvortsov, a Russian installation technician, said he had a choice between working in Turkey or Bangladesh.
He chose Rooppur, moving there with his family in 2024."When I first saw the construction site at Rooppur, I realized how much work lay ahead on this project...
honestly, Rooppur changed me and my life," he told AFP.The project has also transformed the local economy.Md Emon Khan, 28, left his garment-factory job in Dhaka and returned to Rooppur, where he....
