WASHINGTON — A Russian engineer who worked on Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant during the final stages of construction says inexperienced workers, poor oversight and layers of bureaucracy contributed to a rash of equipment failures that delayed the reactor’s startup for almost a year.
A U.S. expert said the engineer’s account added to concerns about the long- term safety of the Middle East’s first nuclear power station, for years a source of tension between Iran and the United States.
In an interview, Alexander Bolgarov predicted that Iran’s inexperience with nuclear power means it will rely on Russia to operate the reactor for the next five or six years.
“They still do not have a nuclear culture necessary to run such a plant,” said the Moscow-trained engineer, who returned home to Lithuania last spring after two years in Iran.
Bolgarov, who helped shepherd Bu shehr through most of its shaky startup, is one of the first insiders to grant an on- the-record interview about the secretive project. The $1 billion plant was built by the Russian company Atomstroyexport and commissioned in a ceremony Sept. 13. The Associated Press
