Russia: Egypt to begin building nuclear reactor in 2020

Egypt will obtain a license to build the Dabaa nuclear plant by mid-2020, the Russian deputy minister of industry and trade said

Georgy Kalamanov added that Russian experts are currently completing designing the nuclear plant and surveying the area where it will be built.

In 2015, Russia and Egypt signed a deal which would see Russia build Egypt’s first nuclear power plant in the Dabaa area, located on Egypt’s northwestern coast. Under the terms of the agreement, Cairo would access a loan for the project from Moscow.

In 2016, the Egyptian official Gazette reported that the loan would amount to $25 billion, which would finance 85 per cent of the cost of contracts signed for the plant’s construction. The loan repayment period is 35 years. Egypt will finance the remaining 15 per cent.

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The Dabaa nuclear plant was planned to consist of four reactors of 1,200 megawatts each.

Critics have condemned the size of the loan at a time when Egypt’s economy is ailing and inflation has reached record highs.