The plans were announced by Minister of Ecology and Natural Resources of Ukraine Ostap Semerak during a meeting with representatives of the international consortium represented by Midas Consulting, as reported by the ministry`s press service.
”Over these 30 years has been significant progress on safety in the exclusion zone and at the Chornobyl nuclear power plant,” said the Minister.
The implementation of the project of construction of the park of solar power plants in the exclusion zone with capacity of at least 100 megawatts was discussed at the meeting.
The Minister stressed that as of today, all the issues have been resolved at the legislative level regarding the legal regime of the zone, which gives base for the transformation of the exclusion zone – the territory which the whole world is accustomed to seeing as a loss-making one, into the zone of innovation and reform.
”The world has long started to abandon fossil fuels and switch to renewable energy sources… Investment flow in the construction of solar power plants will open another page in the history of the development of renewable energy in Ukraine,” said Semerak.
The minister also said that in the exclusion zone there are large areas of unutilized land, part of which can be used for setting up electricity generation capacities and noted that the duration of sunshine in the area is within 1,800-1,900 hours per year.
Following the meeting, the partner of Traficon, Naum Rikshpun assured that participation of NPP in the project will provide technical and organizational components of the project at a global sectoral level and attract the attention of international investors and financial institutions to the development of renewable energy in Ukraine.
In turn, NPP head Esben Christensen expressed hope for successful implementation of the project and full support of the Government of Ukraine.
As UNIAN reported earlier, at its session November 23, 2016 the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine has lowered the cost of lease of state property in the Chornobyl zone to promote development on its territory of alternative energy.