VostGOK will not be joined to Energoatom

The Ministry of Energy and Environmental Protection of Ukraine abandoned plans to join the SE VostGOK to the SE NNEGC Energoatom. This was announced by Head of NNEGC Yurii Nedashkovskyi, Energoreforma reports.

According to him, during the meetings, Head of the Ministry of Energy Olexiy Orzhel said that the reorganization of VostGOK would be implemented in other ways, in particular, in 2020 it is planned to allocate 140 million UAH from the state budget for the development of Novokostiantynivske uranium ore field.

The Ministry is also considering the option of involving a private partner in uranium mining at VostGOK.

VostGOK is the only uranium ore mining and processing enterprise in Ukraine and the largest in Europe. The concentrate is used to produce nuclear fuel (TVEL), which is loaded in nuclear reactors at nuclear power plants.

According to the IAEA, the Eastern Mining and Processing Plant produces 3.3% of the world’s uranium concentrate.

Recall that in July, the Cabinet of Ministers approved the reorganization of the state-owned enterprise Eastern Mining and Processing Plant by joining the state-owned enterprise NNEGC Energoatom.

It was previously reported that VostGOK enterprise reduced the production of uranium oxide concentrate (UOC) by 24.2% (by 145.2 tons) in January-June 2019 compared to the same period in 2018 – to 455.7 tons.

The annual needs of Ukrainian nuclear power plants for uranium concentrate are about 2.4 thousand tons, while the domestic production of the SE VostGOK is about 1 thousand tons.