Bulgaria seeks private money for nuclear plant

Bulgarian Prime Minister Bokyo Borisov said Friday that he wants to revive a partially built nuclear power plant constructed by Russia but abandoned in 2012 by attracting private investment.

"We have to realise this project with private investment," Borisov told Nova television, citing the huge cost of compensation to Russian nuclear export monopoly Atomstroyexport, part of Rosatom.

EU member Bulgaria scrapped plans for the Russian-built 2,000-megawatt nuclear plant near Belene on the Danube river because of the high costs and under pressure from Brussels and Washington.

But an international arbitration court in June ordered Bulgaria to pay 550 million euros ($615 million) to compensate for two reactors that Sofia had ordered, one of which is complete and other half-built.

Since then Bulgaria, which itself invested 700 million euros in the project, has tried and failed to sell some of the equipment, and is having to pay Atomstroyexport 167,000 euros per day in interest payments.

Bulgaria's only operating nuclear plant is at Kozloduy. Its two Soviet-built reactors are due to be turned off in 2017 and 2021. A deal with Westinghouse Electric to build a new reactor there was dropped in 2015.