Bulgaria and Belene NPP’s strategic investor, German RWE, will put pen to paper as soon as possible, said Mardik Papazyan, executive director of national power grid operator NEK.

The state will add BGN 300 million to the operator’s capital so that it can order the equipment, which will take long to make as Russian plants are overwhelmed with orders for Chinese and Turkish nuclear plants, Papazyan said. The global financial downturn is unlikely to affect the Belene project, according to Papazyan.