By Stefan Wagstyl in Vilnius, Robert Anderson in Stockholm and Jan Cienski in Warsaw
The Baltic states and Poland are struggling to settle the political, commercial and environmental problems involved in their joint plan for a €7bn nuclear power station, aimed at easing expected regional electricity shortages and reducing dependence on Russian energy.
The thaw between Poland and Brussels has sent a chill down spines in Lithuania.
Donald Tusk, the new Polish premier, arrived at the European Commission and parliament on Tuesday to show that his country was back in the centre of Europe. The era of the Kaczynskis, “the terrible twins”, picking fights with Brussels, was over.
The fear in Vilnius is that he may stop picking fights with Russia, too, leaving the Baltic republics, which only recently threw off the Soviet yoke, alone in the ring with the bear. Talks on resolving the Russian blockade of Polish meat, which in turn have held up a new EU-Russia partnership agreement to Brussels' ill-concealed annoyance, start next week.
VISAGINAS, Lithuania, Nov 29 (Reuters) - A planned new Lithuanian nuclear plant faces a delay of at least two years to 2017, the head of the country's current sole atomic power facility said on Thursday. Viktor Shevaldin, head of the Ignalina nuclear plant, due to be shut down at the end of 2009 under Lithuania's European Union entry terms, said several uncertainties remained about the planning and eventual construction of a new plant.
Reuters - By Nerijus Adomaitis and Patrick Lannin
VILNIUS, Nov 26 (Reuters) - Prime Minister Gediminas Kirkilas believes Lithuania can still build a new nuclear power plant by 2015 but uncertainties over the timetable and capacity remain, he said on Monday.
The project, led by Lithuania and involving Latvia, Estonia and Poland, has already become bogged down by Warsaw's demand for one third of the new plant's output.
TALLINN - Top government and energy officials have reiterated Estonia's desire to own a stake in a nuclear power plant that may be built in Finland over the next decade. Prime Minister Andrus Ansip said on Sept. 11 that the Baltic state was interested in the nuclear project which, if built, would be Finland's sixth nuclear power plant.
TALLINN, June 20 (RIA Novosti) - The Estonian Maritime Academy has developed a project to construct an underwater nuclear reactor off the Baltic Sea coast, a local newspaper said Wednesday.
The project, submitted to the Estonian Eesti Energia company, proposes the construction of a 1,000-MWt nuclear power plant on a granite shelf of the Muuga Bay.
