US, Armenia sign agreement on nuclear energy

Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan and US Vice President JD Vance signed a joint statement on the completion of negotiations on the Agreement on Cooperation between the Government of the Republic of Armenia and the Government of the United States of America in the Field of Peaceful Use of Nuclear Energy during Vance's visit to Armenia.

Once the agreement is set up it will enable US and Armenian companies to "strike deals" on civil nuclear projects, Vance said: "That means up to USD5 billion in initial US exports plus an additional USD4 billion in long-term support through fuel and maintenance contracts."

Formal cooperation agreements are required between countries that want to trade nuclear power goods and services, and those involving the USA are called 123 Agreements after the paragraph of the country's 1954 Atomic Energy Act which requires them.

"This is a classic win-win for both Armenia and the United States of America," Vance said. "This means stronger energy security for my own country and I also think it means stronger energy security for Armenia, and it also will create a lot of new jobs back home in the United States. It means small modular reactors, American technologies will be coming to this country."

The announcement came days after Alexey Likhachev, CEO of Russia's state nuclear corporation Rosatom, met with Alen Simoyan, speaker of Armenia's National Assembly, to discuss progress with the project to extend the operating life of the Armenian Nuclear Power Plant. According to Rosatom, those discussions also included the construction of new nuclear power units in Armenia, with Rosatom offering "comprehensive cooperation, including the construction of large, medium, and small-capacity nuclear power plants and the implementation of related projects, including non-nuclear ones".

_{(Image: Rosatom)}

Armenia currently operates one nuclear reactor - a 376 MWe VVER reactor at the Armenia Nuclear Power plant, which started operating in 1980. The plant was home to two units, which were taken offline in 1988 due to safety concerns regarding seismic vulnerability. Unit 2 was restarted in 1995, and Rosatom is currently collaborating in a project to extend the unit's life to 2036. Unit 1 is now being decommissioned.

Armenia has been considering the potential construction of new nuclear capacity for some time. In January 2022, Rosatom and the management of the Armenian Nuclear Power Plant signed an agreement to look into the possible building of new Russian-designed nuclear power units on the site of the current plant at Metsamor, and in

January 2024, officials stated that Armenia planned to build a new nuclear plant within 8-10 years, with technology options from Russia, the USA and South Korea under evaluation.

Armenia's Minister of Territorial Administration and Infrastructure David Khudatyan, speaking at a press conference on 6 February, said Armenia is currently reviewing proposed "modular nuclear reactor" models from Russia, the USA, France, China, and South Korea. "I believe the selection of the model will be made in 2026 or 2027," he said, according to the Armenpress news agency.