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The Rostov Nuclear Power Plant is a subsidiary of Rosenergoatom (an affiliate of Rosatom’s largest electric power division). The plant is located on the bank of the Tsimlyanskoye Reservoir near Volgodonsk.

Rosenergoatom is the largest power generating company in Russia and the second largest in the world in terms of nuclear generation capacity. It includes all ten Russia’s nuclear power plants as its affiliates, as well as power plant support companies.

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President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Good afternoon, friends, colleagues,

I would like to cordially congratulate you all on the completion of the large-scale job and commissioning of the fourth unit of the Rostov nuclear power plant. I would like to thank the scientists, engineers, workers, all those who contributed to the making of the facility and achieved this impressive result. I know that you used a straight flow method which allowed for the efficient use of the allocated resources, doing everything as planned and with high quality. This has been a huge, large-scale job which you have been pursuing for several years now, and today it is coming to a close.

Last year the nuclear power generation set an absolute record by producing 200 billion KW of electricity. I also congratulate you on this. And I would like to thank you for that job. On the whole, nuclear power amounts to 19 percent of the overall electricity generation. However, we will keep developing this high-tech industry which is effectively operating.

What we take particular pride in today is the fact that we are launching new aggregates that meet the highest, if not top, reliability and security requirements.

And it is certainly crucial that our competencies have been acknowledged throughout the world, we keep construction not only domestically but also abroad. We are building respective nuclear power facilities in 12 countries, and we will continue this work further.

By launching the fourth unit of the nuclear power station in Rostov we will cover the current and future demand for electricity needed not only in Rostov and the Rostov Region, but also the whole of southern Russia.

Let me congratulate you once again and wish you all the very best. Please let’s go ahead and put the unit into operation.

Rosatom CEO Alexei Likhachev: Thank you, Mr President, for your kind warm words. We are excited but at the same time a little worried too on this special day.

Indeed, the Rostov nuclear power plant is exceptional and it is the youngest because of the average age of the workers working here and also the age of the equipment. The first power unit was launched in 2001, the second in 2010 with your participation, and then in 2014.

And here we are on this special day. I would certainly like to single out a very important aspect, an unusual point to do with the Rostov NPP. It is like a “university” for the nuclear industry builders. Construction competencies were being reborn here, we learnt to transit from a regime of stress, a regime of total industry mobilisation to a serial construction of nuclear power plants which is very important, primarily, for our work abroad. Let me pass the floor now to the plant’s director Andrei Salnikov.

Vladimir Putin: Mr Salnikov, please go ahead.

Rostov Nuclear Power Plant Director Andrei Salnikov: Mr President,

In 2010 you attended the launch of the second unit at the Rostov NPP. The workers still recall you saying that the government will support the construction of the third and the forth units at the Rostov NPP. I am ready to report to you today that the task of constructing the Rostov nuclear power plant comprising four units has been completed in full.

At present we are in the unit control room of the fourth unit of the Rostov nuclear power plant. The reactor is running at 40 percent, the generator is synchronised with the Unified Power System of Russia, and the unit is generally ready to step up the load to its nominal value in accordance with the power testing programme. Let me increase the load, Mr President.

Vladimir Putin: Please ad.

Andrei Salnikov: Unit control room personnel, start step-by-step power ascension.

Operator: Received and carrying out instructions.

Andrei Salnikov: 285 MW. 290 MW. 297 MW. The unit’s power capacity is 300 MW.

Mr President, the power ascension is proceeding correctly. No deviations found.

Vladimir Putin: My congratulations once again. Thank you very much.

Alexei Likhachev: Mr President, the construction of such a huge unit is the result of the work of thousands of people and hundreds of groups: builders, technicians, mechanical engineers. Of course, we always invite them to such special occasions when a power plant goes into operation.

We have here today not just guests, not just workers of our enterprises but also representatives from a large number of working dynasties where expertise has been passed down from generation to generation and where parents act as mentors for their children.

But here, at Atommash in Volgodonsk, there is another interesting story. Here, the movement of millionaire welders was born. For several years, Rosatom has been winning the WorldSkills Russia Hi-Tech grand prix. Our welders are the absolute winners of this contest and win the top prize. A large competency centre was set up at Atommash in Volgodonsk to develop this trade.

We have many dynasties present here today. The Pobedny family, the Khlebnikov family. The Duimamet family of welders holds a special place, of course. I would like to give the floor to Alexander Duimamet, with your permission.

Vladimir Putin: Go ahead, please.

Alexander Duimamet: Hello, Mr President.

Vladimir Putin: Good afternoon.

Alexander Duimamet: You see Russia’s three best welders in front of you who took part in the national WorldSkills Hi-Tech championships. In 2016, Dmitry Kucheryavin became the country’s absolute champion, in 2017 it was Alexei Grigorovich. But for me, the best welder is my father. He has always set an example so I can follow in his footsteps. His knowledge and experience that he passed down to me helped me become the 2015 absolute champion.

In mid-February, the Nastavnik 2018 forum will be held. We will all take part in it and will share our skills and experience with everyone.

Mr President, we invite you to participate in that forum.

Vladimir Putin: When and where will it be held?

Alexander Duimamet: February 13–15 at VDNKh exhibition centre in Moscow, Pavilion 75.

Vladimir Putin: I will try. Thank you for the invitation

It is indeed an interesting as well as a very necessary event and I am sure that the standard of it will be high. Hence it will be a success. We need such events, and we need such a movement of mentors. We really do.

You are proud of your father, and I am very pleased to hear that. I think, the whole country will learn about it and hear about it too. And this is a very good example of how to bring up a son in a family, passing down skills and attitude to life. This is a very important integrated task.

Regarding your choice of profession, I should say that it deserves special respect and attention because recently we confronted a huge problem. We discovered that we do not have good specialists, especially when it comes to the power line facilities. We invited them from abroad. Not only this, but this also contributed to making us hold national and regional competitions, take part in international contests for working professions.

I should say without any exaggeration that working professions nowadays require the highest, sometimes the maximum qualifications. I have just spoken with your colleagues at Rostselmash, and its head told me that out of 10,000 personnel, and this is a large number of staff, 41 percent have a university degree while many of them are employed as workers. Why? Because the equipment is becoming ever more complicated, and people with university degrees find self-realisation, and find the job self-fulfilling and feel comfortable in this work. This constant flare and need for self-improvement, acquisition of new competencies and new skills is something that is really important in today’s life as well as in today’s economy.

In this respect, mentoring is none the less important, of course. I will be happy to participate in your event; at any rate, I will take a look at my schedule and try to amend it so as to be able to visit you and listen to how you work, to discuss these topics which are vital for our economy and our country.

Thank you very much to all of you, I wish you all the very best.