TR Nuclear Energy Program

[TheInsider]

What you are saying seems completely inaccurate to me.

1. Most of the uranium fuel are produced by 2 Turkic nations. Saying Turks are somehow scared of Uranium because it is “dangerous” is, well silly.
2. Turkish-Russian reactor project may not include any local pellet, rod production but it is known we wanted local fuel production and storage of depleted fissile material. How else are you going to produce it locally without mining it yourself.
3. Pakistan got huge amounts of uranium enrichment centrifuges other parts from Türkiye.
4. Every other year there is some nuclear material seized in Türkiye.
5. Gaddafi had a large amount of yellow cake, some say on Twitter that Türkiye bought it after Libya fell when they couldn't technologically handle centrifuges given to them by Pakistan. They handed over centrifuges to west like fools hoping a reward but Libya showed weakness by not being able to handle making even a single nuke. If you can't become a wolf then you are just food. Like several Muslim nations.
6. Announcing nuclear weapons program by Erdoğan also can't be done without actually gathering enough nuclear warheads beforehand. That would be suicide.
7. Iraq, Libya, Syria were invaded because their nuclear programs were uncovered before a nuclear weapons test.
8. Most likely we were enriching uranium secretly as long as Pakistan was. We just didn't announce it until Erdoğan.

I am no insider though.

1) Former Soviet Republics. Those are leftover Soviet mines and those states are not fully in control. They are not producing fuel they are just excavating ore under heavy IAEA control and supervision.
2) Nope. Everything you do has to be done under strict IAEA supervision otherwise you will become the next N.Korea. Russians are not dumb enough to create a nuclear Turkiye. Not that we need anything from Russia for the mining and production of fuel rods or weapons-grade enrichment.
3) Yes true but you can use centrifuges for anything. You can buy centrifuges online. There is no way to ban centrifuge trade.
4) Do you know that you can enrich fissile materials in your garage? If you find 100g it is nothing big if you find 1 ton it is big news. Those radioactive samples are far from being the weapons-grade.
8) No we haven't enriched any fissile materials (excluding scientific purposes and medical isotopes) and we won't be enriching anything in the near future. We are smart enough not to put horses behind the cart.

 

[Sanchez]

[*]Turkish-Russian reactor project may not include any local pellet, rod production but it is known we wanted local fuel production and storage of depleted fissile material. How else are you going to produce it locally without mining it yourself.

I don’t know what we wanted from the Russians but i do know on the deal we signed, Russia brings all the fuel and then returns every used material back, as operating the complex fully falls onto Rosatom. We don’t own anything re Akkuyu but the land it’s built on.

 

[DBdev]

Guys Türkiye just like Saudi Arabia already said a dozen times that we will also have nuclear weapons the next day if Iran builds them. Erdogan rejected not having own nuclear weapons on TV. What are you even talking about at this point. LOL.

Well Iran is a week away from having a nuke for several years, officially. Unofficially they have at least 5 nukes already and they even tested them a few years back. An earthquake at 0 kilometers was registered globally near their reactor and there were videos of white dust—contaminated calcium oxide particles originating from pulverized and calcined corals - coming of a mountain top exactly like the Pakistani nuclear weapons test video. It was on Israeli nuclear war watch account terror alarm IIRC.

Syria and North Korea built more than one breeding reactor for Plutonium based nuclear weapon. After the first one destroyed by Israel. They built a new one. Also ISIS with orders from Israel and USA even tried to take over heavy water reactor of Assad unsuccessfully. It is publicly available information.

Khan network... No, not that youtube Khan network, the other one, one with the Abdul Qadeer Khan the nuclear scientist that created Pakistan's and several other Muslim nations secret nuclear weapons programs had a big partner whose name was hidden from news agencies when news was first broken by the west many decades ago. Well that was Türkiye.

All the other clients were attacked by the west directly and militarily by the USA since. And we were attacked indirectly several times, with FETO coup, with Trump's "I destroyed Turkish economy" "speculative currency attack" confession and by pushing millions of Syrians to once again trying to destabilize the Turkish government. etc. etc.

Believe what you want. Not going to comment any further on this.

 

[Saithan]

Sauce ?

 

[Sanchez]

Guys Türkiye just like Saudi Arabia already said a dozen times that we will also have nuclear weapons the next day if Iran builds them. Erdogan rejected not having own nuclear weapons on TV.

I did write stuff that would be read that way in the past. But no, Turkey have never said such thing, neither did Saudi.

had a big partner whose name was hidden from news agencies when news was first broken by the west many decades ago. Well that was Türkiye.

No, it’s Saudi Arabia.

All the other clients were attacked by the west directly and militarily by the USA since. And we were attacked indirectly several times, with FETO coup, with Trump's "I destroyed Turkish economy" "speculative currency attack" confession and by pushing millions of Syrians to once again trying to destabilize the Turkish government. etc. etc.

Believe what you want. Not going to comment any further on this.

None of those happened because we tried to covertly get a nuclear device or related material.

Lots of words, half of which directly wrong. This is not the mic drop you think it is.

 

[Huelague]

Turkey have never said such thing, neither did Saudi.

But Erdogan do, multiple times.

 

[Sanchez]

But Erdogan do, multiple times.

Erdogan is one of the names that make up “Turkey”. And no, he didn’t, never in that tone.

 

[Bogeyman]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1799093827661389995

 

[Huelague]

Erdogan is one of the names that make up “Turkey”. And no, he didn’t, never in that tone.

He said it. Believe it or not. The tone doesn’t count.

 

[No Name]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1799093827661389995

If those nuclear reactors are owned, and operated by foreign companies, then there is no point in having them as all the profits are going to go to foreign countries, thus harming Turkey's economy.

Turkey needs to find a way to buy 49 per cent of the shares in Akkuyu NGS Elektrik Uretim Corp so that some of the money will stay in the country, but I doubt that the Russians will surrender those shares to Turkeys.

 

[what]

If a company builds and operates a plant in Turkey, most of the money stays in the country, they pay taxes on the profits and get whatever profit they have out. Plus the plant itself is creating jobs, the construction is.

Vs.

We import coal, oil, gas and all of it goes abroad, there's no local "production", people working in the country. All of it goes out of the economy for the fuel alone.

 

[UkroTurk]

The Rosatom agreement for Akkuyu provides for setting up a fuel fabrication plant in Turkey.

I really wonder if Türkiye could create an ecosystem of nuclear fuel( mining, milling, fining, conversion , enrichment, reconversion)

İt would cost 3-4 billion USD but how much do we pay for energy moreover we would be Totally energy independent.

 

[Kartal1]

Turkiye and the USA are discussing nuclear power plant projects

Turkiy is in talks with the USA on the construction of large-scale nuclear power plants and small modular reactors (SMR). Ministry of Energy official Yusuf Ceylan stated that the USA showed serious interest in Turkiye's goal of increasing its nuclear energy capacity.

Ceylan stated that negotiations are being carried out for the areas where existing power plants are located or for new power plants. US Ambassador Jeff Flake said that they are working to reduce Turkiye's dependence on Russia for energy.

Turkiye continues its negotiations with South Korea and Russia for a second nuclear power plant in Sinop in the Black Sea region, and with China's SPIC company for a third power plant in Thrace.

Turkiye's first 4,800 MW capacity nuclear power plant is being built by Russia's Rosatom company in Akkuyu. Turkiye plans to reach a total capacity of 20,000 MW.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1811409059850903972

 

[what]

They are more than welcome to try, but in the US or any democracy, what the government says and encourages doesn't necessarily dictate whether a US company will follow suit and invest.

In contrast, authoritarian countries like China and Russia have significant control over their companies, even if they appear private, allowing them to deliver on their promises and finance projects more effectively. It's easier to do business with these countries, but there are always strings attached.

 

[Nilgiri]

They are more than welcome to try, but in the US or any democracy, what the government says and encourages doesn't necessarily dictate whether a US company will follow suit and invest.

In contrast, authoritarian countries like China and Russia have significant control over their companies, even if they appear private, allowing them to deliver on their promises and finance projects more effectively. It's easier to do business with these countries, but there are always strings attached.

More the case with the heavy capital of older generation reactors....as their costs were significant w.r.t westinghouse (US) vs French vs Russian.

SMR's on other hand dont have same footprint in capital. They can also be distributed in the power grid lot more easily.

That is why NuScale has essentially been embedded with the US DOE and has taken off like it has in a few short years....compared to decades of westinghouse, GE et al stories (i.e massive conglomerates, existing for long time and with diverged separate inertia to US govt organs relative to their different periods of close intersection...... like you say that sometimes now needs further lobbying given huge array of working parts and their pricepoints, as after all they are answerable to their shareholders).

The SMRs are going to be aggresively pushed by all sides with their iteration of the tech involved....the Chinese have made a number of breakthroughs recently to make their tech-arc more attractive as well to compete with the big 3....in fact in SMR its going to be mostly US vs China here for a decade or two.

Turks will have to judge and go for best one. Some mix of heavy capital 3rd gen and SMR 4th gen. Maybe some geopolitical hedging involved (i.e maybe part of reason to look at Koreans and Chinese for 3rd gen too, instead of further VVER from Russia).... but at same time not too much so that you get some economy of scale onshore to develop yourself over time too.

 

[Huelague]

We have some delays on Akkuyu program. Nazi-Germany will not send the turbines to Türkiye, which stuck on customs.

 

[Lool]

We have some delays on Akkuyu program. Nazi-Germany will not send the turbines to Türkiye, which stuck on customs.

I heard that the govt reordered the turbine from China, during the first 3 months of the year, after the German authorities stalled its delivery from the customs to appease primarily Greek, Jewish, and American concerns of Turkey owning nuclear tech

Iam not sure about the info though

 

[Huelague]

I heard that the govt reordered the turbine from China, during the first 3 months of the year, after the German authorities stalled its delivery from the customs to appease primarily Greek, Jewish, and American concerns of Turkey owning nuclear tech

Iam not sure about the info though

But why the route above germany?

 

[Lool]

But why the route above germany?

What do you mean?

 

[Sanchez]

Bloomberg claims, citing unnamed officials as usual.

Turkey’s foreign, defense and energy ministers visited Niger on Wednesday to secure access to the West African nation’s rich uranium deposits.
The delegation, which is led by Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan and includes top spy chief Ibrahim Kalin, wants to tap Nigerien supplies of the fissile mineral to fuel Turkey’s nascent nuclear-power industry, according to people familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified as they’re not authorized to speak to the media.
The trip comes after Niger’s military government withdrew mining rights from Canadian and French companies to develop uranium deposits. The country has been controlled by a junta since a coup in July 2023, and its elected president, Mohamed Bazoum, has been in detention since then.
Turkey wants uranium supplies for Mediterranean Akkuyu — its first nuclear power plant, which is being built by Russia’s state-run Rosatom — and two other planned facilities. Niger has about 5% of the world’s uranium resources and ranks among the top 10 sources of the fuel, according to the World Nuclear Association.

The Turkish visit comes as Russia itself is trying to acquire some of Niger’s uranium assets, Bloomberg reported last month. Turkey also has a long-term fuel-supply contract with Rosatom as part of the Akkuyu project and doesn’t currently have the capacity to convert or enrich uranium ore into the material needed for reactors.

Bloomberg - Are you a robot?

To clarify, Turkey and Niger did sign a DoI to develop oil and gas fields in Niger but there was no mention of anything uranium related in the official presser. To add, per Akkuyu deal, Rosatom is tasked to handle all parts of nuclear fuel, including bringing into the country and returning the spent rods.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1813649875411865921