Authorities in Belarus said the Belarusian Nuclear Power Plant had been awarded a license to construct a second reactor near the town of Ostrovets, Grodno Oblast, about 10 miles from the Lithuanian border.
Construction began in November 2013 for the facility that was long derailed by the 1986 nuclear plant disaster at Chernobyl in the neighboring country of Ukraine. (At the time of the Chernobyl event, both Ukraine and Belarus were part of the Soviet Union, which broke apart in December of 1991.)
Merged Russian company NIAEP – ASE (Nizhny Novgorod Engineering Company- Atomstrojeksport) is the general designer and contractor for the project, which envisions two reactors with a total capacity of 2,400MW.
The license for the first unit, an AES 2006 reactor, was issued in April 214, five months after the first concrete was poured for the units, which are scheduled for completion in 2018 and 2020, respectively.
In Southern India
In India, the Kudanjulam Nuclear Power Project commenced commercial operations as of midnight, media from the subcontinent are reporting.
The unit had been operating at full capacity for 10 days. The first unit at the plant reached criticality in July. It has been connected to India's southern grid.
The India News said the long-awaited commercial start is expected to relieve demand issues in several areas, including Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, Karnataka and Kerala, which are states and territories that comprise a major portion of the southern tip of India.