ISTANBUL (Reuters) -Turkey may work with the United States and South Korea for its second planned nuclear power plant, Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar said on Thursday, adding this may be in the form of a trilateral model.
Ankara has said it was in talks with Russia, China, Canada and South Korea on possible new nuclear power plants, in the northern Sinop and Western Thrace regions, to add to the Akkuyu nuclear power plant it is building with Russia.
Speaking to broadcaster CNN Turk, Bayraktar said President Tayyip Erdogan had discussed cooperation on both small and big reactors with the leaders of Canada and France, adding that the country would cooperate with the United States for both small modular and conventional plant development after a meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House last month.
“We can say the United States and (South) Korea got added together. Therefore, there may be a trilateral model with Korea-America-Turkey,” he said, while repeating that the first reactor of Akkuyu would be operational in 2026.
Bayraktar also said Turkey wanted access to cheap energy and technology transfer, know-how with such investments, and that an accord providing these was reached with Russia on Akkuyu, so it would also seek the same for its second nuclear power plant.
(Reporting by Can Sezer; Writing by Tuvan Gumrukcu; Editing by Daniel Wallis)
