See previous part: How Russia prepared to seize Ukraine’s nuclear energy. Part 5: Bloody electricity The 90-year legacy: from elite USSR institute to strategic decline After a series of articles published on the internet regarding scandals surrounding a strategic enterprise in the nuclear industry related to project engineering, it is difficult not to talk about another aspect of betrayal and Derkach’s covert network. Let’s understand what is happening with the Kharkiv Institute Energoproekt (Energy Project) and whose interests it actually serves. The Kharkiv Institute Energoproekt was founded 90 years ago and carried out significant projects related to nuclear and thermal power engineering. Today, as the general designer, the institute boasts such iconic completed projects as the construction of the Zaporizhzhia and South Ukraine Nuclear Power Plants. At one time, the Kharkiv Institute Energoproekt was among the elite project and scientific-technical institutions of the USSR. Unfortunately, over the past 10 years, the institute has lost a significant portion of its expertise and highly skilled personnel. There were periods when entire departments were laid off from the institute, and it was precisely during this period that other private project organizations with the same scope of activities and personnel emerged, with staff members who had “migrated” from the Kharkiv Institute Energoproekt. As a result of a substantial and painful reduction in the number of engineering personnel, the volume of work carried out by the institute has significantly decreased, and the institute’s production facilities have mostly been leased out. Even before the start of the military actions, the staff was reduced from 600 employees to 200 according to the latest published reports, and the gross income amounted to 35-40 million UAH (953, 000- 1 million USD) per year, which, when converted to wages, is the lowest indicator in the industry. In other words, a skilled engineer with experience earns no more than 10,000 UAH (272 USD) per month on average. It is evident that over these years, the strategic enterprise has gradually declined to a small project company with limited competencies and is losing competitiveness even in the Ukrainian nuclear energy market, not to mention the international market. Who are these interested parties in the decline of such an institute? The 2007 Russian blueprint: Myronyuk and the Power Machines takeover Let’s start with an introduction. Particularly revealing and cynical is the protocol, which...