Page 70 - IRANRptOct22

Iran to create nuclear-powered desalination plants
Tavanir official gives progress update on Iran’s construction of nine thermal power plants
Iran sets aside $40bn in reserves for nuclear power construction programme
Iran is set to build two water desalination plants in the southern city of Bushehr on the Persian Gulf, IRNA reported on August 15. They would be powered by electricity produced by the nearby Bushehr nuclear power plant. The country of 85mn is suffering from increasing droughts in the face of climate change. In some Persian Gulf and Caspian Sea localities suffering a lack of rainfall, efforts at addressing water scarcity are pinned on desalinating water. Among big water consumers suffering water deficits are many hydroelectricity plants.
According to the governor of Bushehr Province, Ahmad Mohammadizadeh, the nuclear-powered desalination plant project would get under way at the end of this month.
The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran will participate in the construction.
The plants would each be able to produce up to 150,000 cubic metres of potable water per day.
The nuclear power plant in Bushehr in its current state can produce around a gigawatt of electricity per hour with one reactor in operation.
The plant was built with the assistance of the Russian state-owned nuclear company Rosatom.
In 2014, Russia and Iran signed an agreement to build two more power units in Bushehr.
The construction of nine thermal power plants across Iran, begun in February, has reached the 60% progress threshold, according to the deputy managing director of the Iranian Electricity Generation, Distribution and Transmission Company (Tavanir), as cited by IRIB on May 31.
Iran desperately needs to build up its non-hydro electricity supplies. Persistent drought has affected the country's ability to produce energy from hydro-electric dams located around Tehran and elsewhere. The development of nuclear power in Iran has, meanwhile, not progressed as rapidly as was hope for in recent years.
"The power plants that are being built with industry investment will have a generating capacity of 5,300 megawatts," the Tavanir director, Seyed Zaman Hosseini, said.
Breaking down progress, he noted that in the provinces of Semnan, Isfahan, Khuzestan, Yazd, Kerman, Khorasan, Hormozgan, Markazi and Sistan-Baluchistan, thermal power plant work had progressed to the extent of 90%, 86%, 72%, 64%, 57%, 50% , 48%, 24% and 22%, respectively.
“All the thermal power plants will be equipped with MAP2B gas turbines manufactured by MAPNA Group, a leading Iranian engineering and energy company,” Zaman Hosseini added.
Iran’s state budget for the next Persian calendar year (starts late March 2022) sets aside the equivalent of $40bn in reserves for the construction of nuclear power plants, Mehr News Agency reported.
Iran boasts the 1,000 MW Bushehr nuclear power plant—the first such civilian facility in the Middle East—that was connected to the grid in 2013, and the drought experienced by the country this year, its worst in 50 years, and climate change considerations appear to have brought home to officials the need to accelerate the construction of more such power plants. Iranians endured substantial power cuts during the hottest months as a lack of rainfall meant much of Iran’s hydroelectricity capacity could not be deployed.
Head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, Mohammad Eslami, was quoted as saying by Mehr that the construction of additional nuclear power
70 IRAN Country Report October 2022 www.intellinews.com