Aktau. December 10. Interfax-Kazakhstan - During public hearings held in Aktau (the administrative center of Mangistau region, west Kazakhstan) last Friday the local community gave their go-ahead to conduct a feasibility study for the construction of Kazakhstan’s first nuclear power plant (NPP) near this city, said a correspondent from Interfax-Kazakhstan.

Askar Kasabekov, vice president of Kazakh nuclear company Kazatomprom, said at the hearings that the government had already prepared a draft resolution on the project.

'Government’s resolution with respect to feasibility study for the construction of the nuclear power plant is coming,' Kasabekov said.

The Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry reported earlier that the feasibility study should be completed in 2009 and would cost up to 12 billion tenge (120.76 tenge/$1). This year, 152 million tenge were allotted for this purpose.

The nuclear power plant is expected be located 10 kilometers from Aktau, Kasabekov said.

The plant will be supplied with VBER-300 reactors, which have a good record of operation onboard military vessels, he said.

Meanwhile, chairman of the committee for nuclear energy in the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources Timur Zhantikin said that the feasibility study report, when completed, will be sent to the experts for review and then public hearings will decide if the construction of an NPP in Aktau is feasible.

As reported, the government of Kazakhstan revealed its intent to construct an NPP near Lake Balkhash for the first time in 1998. It was also stated then that the first unit of Balkhash NPP would be put into service in 2005 and the whole plant would be running not earlier than in 2015. At the time, Kazakh experts estimated the total cost of the plant at $2 bl. However, later the government of the republic postponed the construction of the NPP given a negative public response.

In October 2006, then Premier Danial Akhmetov ordered to allocate funds from the government's reserve for the feasibility study for NPP construction.

Lately, the officials of Kazakhstan repeatedly stated that Kazakhstan could construct an NPP in Aktau at the site of decommissioned fast breeder reactor BN-350. BN-350 was put in service at MAEK energy complex in 1973.

In early November this year Kazakh Prime Minister Karim Masimov told the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources to prepare a resolution about construction of a nuclear power plant in Mangistau region (west Kazakhstan).

“The Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources is to prepare a draft resolution about construction of a nuclear power plant in Mangistau region and submit this resolution to the prime minister’s registry office within a week,” Masimov said during his trip to Aktau at a November 21st meeting of the governmental committee for nuclear power plant construction project.

“The issue is now closed. The nuclear power plant will be definitely built,” Masimov said then.

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