Iran has been in the news lately as a coalition of Western nations tries to reestablish the nuclear treaty canceled by the Trump administration. In addition to issues around the possibility of Iran constructing nuclear weapons, there are also other nuclear issues in Iran involving their single nuclear power plant.
     Iran’s only nuclear power plant in the port city of Bushehr was constructed by Russia and brought online in 2011. The plant was shut down temporarily last week due to “technical issues”. The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) issued a statement on June 20th that the Bushehr plant was being temporarily shut down due to “technical issues”. This was the first time that an emergency shutdown of the plant has been reported. The cause of the problem was not specified. The plant was disconnected from the grid after a one-day notice was sent to the Iranian Energy Ministry.
     Ali Akbar Salehi is the head of Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI). He said Saturday that the Bushehr plant would be restarting operations in the near future. He spoke during a meeting on Saturday afternoon with the deputy speaker of the parliament Ali Nikzad and other parliamentarians. One of the topics of discussion was nuclear power generation capacities. Salehi said that the problem at the Bushehr plant was almost fixed, and that electricity generated by the plant would be entering Iran’s grid within a few days.
     Speaking to the parliament news website on Saturday, Salehi downplayed the seriousness of the emergency shutdown and said that such problems at nuclear power plants was “natural”.
      When the news of the shutdown was made public, some analysts wondered if it was connected in some way with Russia withholding promised fuel or critical technical support for the reactor. This suspicion was reinforced when Salehi also announced on Saturday that Iran will pay Russia more than five hundred million that it owes.
     Salehi also said on Saturday that because of U.S. sanctions imposed following the withdrawal of the U.S. from the 2015 nuclear agreement of world powers, that Iran has been unable to pay Russia five hundred million euros that it owes for the two other nuclear power plants currently being constructed in Iran by Russia. In addition to the construction projects, money was also owed for fuel for the Bushehr power plant.
      Salehi blamed “financial issues” for not being able to reach the target of eight gigawatts of nuclear generated electricity. He added that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has always said that the AEOI should plan for twenty or even thirty gigawatts fuel cycles. The Iranian parliament has recommended that prepare for generating twenty gigawatts. The Bushehr plant generates just one gigawatt. This is a very small contribution to the more than sixty gigawatts of electricity that Iran consumes on a daily basis.
     Tavanir is Iran’s power generation and distribution company. An official of the company said last week that the shutdown of the Bushehr reactor could cause more outages in the country. Iran is currently producing sixty gigawatts but is consuming sixty-two gigawatts daily.
      Iran has been struggling with daily power cuts due to higher summer consumption. Officials have also blamed higher power consumption by cryptocurrency miners. In addition, there is wastage of over ten percent resulting from insufficient resources to maintain the infrastructure.
     On Saturday, Salehi also said that the Bushehr power plant will run out of fuel in the next two or three months. Russia provides fuel for the Bushehr plant under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Fuel for the Bushehr power plant costs about thirty to forty million euros per year.