16 February 2004 22:13
St Petersburg factory ships off turbine rotor for Russian Far East power station
Anatoliy Chubays's favourite creation - weighing 100 t and measuring 6.5 m. in width - was hauled through the
streets of St Petersburg last night. The third turbine rotor for the Bureya hydroelectric power station [GES] in
Maritime Territory [as heard - the station is in Amur Region], a long-delayed Soviet-era project, has been completed in
St Petersburg. Construction of the station started in 1985 and only resumed in 2000 when Anatoliy Chubays headed
Russia's power generation industry. Vladimir Putin personally commissioned the first hydroelectric power unit for
the Bureya GES last year.
However Putin's adviser [on economic issues], Andrey Illarionov, has described the project as the swindle of the
year. He reckons it is expensive and unadvantageous. In actual fact, the Bureya GES is only unadvantageous to the coal
mines and their owner, the MDM Group. Electricity from the hydroelectric station is cheaper and does not pollute the
environment.
[RTR Russia TV] |
RUSSIA IN FACTS
