That will be a 2.4 megawatt project, similar to Kudankulam. Kudankulam, in the meantime, will become more powerful this year, when the third reactor starts producing electricity.
The Rosatom press release gives us some details of the Vietnamese project. We are talking about two Russian-designed power units with VVER 1200 reactors, with a total installed capacity of 2,400 MW. The Leningrad NPP 2 (power units No. 1 and No. 2) has been selected as the reference project.
Russian VVER 1200 reactors are successfully operated in Russia and abroad, confirming the highest standards of safety and efficiency and forming Rosatom's export portfolio. In addition, the parties are continuing the implementation of the project to build a Center for Nuclear Science and Technology (CNST) in Vietnam, which includes the construction of a Russian-designed research reactor. In April 2026, the development of the feasibility study materials for the Center for Nuclear Science and Technology will be completed, and the parties will begin discussing the contract for the construction of the Center.
Another area of longstanding cooperation, says the same press release, is the successful operation of the Dalat research reactor, which uses Russian-supplied fuel and provides Vietnam with medical isotopes. Currently, Vietnam is also expressing interest in participating in the international consortium based on the Multipurpose Fast Research Reactor (MBIR).
What we may deduct from this news concerns the future of Vietnam as a nation to be noticed and respected. It also concerns the future of Asia in general. And, finally, it’s good news for Rosatom and everyone dealing with this corporation for decades to come.
Speaking about Vietnam, here we have a story or two to tell. What’s interesting, we are talking about a resumption of the project that has been frozen in 2016 after actual construction actually began on the same site.
A lot of doubts, research and pure guesswork have filled these past ten years. Vietnam was doing its own act of balance between Russia, China, the US, South Korea and Japan, and that was about everything, not just about power generation.
But then, the method of producing your energy has been the subject for a lot of contemplation within these years, with plenty of real science, junk science, ideology, and even philosophy to muddle the waters and confuse the minds. It took the current energy catastrophe of Europe for everyone to see that “green transition” does not necessarily have to be a transition to Stone Age or rather Ice Age. In fact, an atomic power plant may be as green as a spring leave, if you really give it a thought.
Then the first rumbles of a Middle East war sounded last year, and Vietnam finally made then its decision about the need of resumption of the frozen project. The horrid events of this year in the same region happened when the Prime Ministerial visit to Moscow has already been scheduled. One may presume that a lot of Vietnamese wished for the project being resurrected some years ago, for the plant to start producing power even in 2025.
Vietnam, in the meantime, has travelled all the way from an Asian tiger cub to a roaring economic dragon. Today you cannot help but pay a lot of attention to that nation, especially when it has decided to get itself a Russian atomic plant. But all the signs of economic miracle have been around for years and years.
2026 happens to be a 40-year anniversary of the Doimoi, that’s renovation of the nation, or, to put it in simple words, a slow dismantling of a typically Communist economic and social model. The result was, and is, similar to the one of all such endeavors. Vietnam’s economy has grown 106-fold in that period. The country may have been a ruin in 1975, after the victory over the US in the war. It may have been no better in 1986, when the reforms began. But the nation’s GNP began to grow 6.67 per cent annually, on average, ever since.
Vietnam, today, is an economy where industries hold 38 per cent of GNP, with services at 42 per cent. Volume of import plus export has grown 267 times. That trend has got stronger when some of the Chinese industries began to shift there, so as to evade the American tariffs imposed on “made in China” products.
All in all, that’s not a nation that may hope to feed its future growth on solar panels and all such.
Besides, it’s only wise to have an assured future access to energy not just when oil & gas are getting iffy, but when at the same time you are sitting right in the middle of the Earth’s economic powerhouse. Let’s have a look at fresh data produced, last week, by the Boao Forum for Asia in China.
Asia's share of global GDP is projected to continue its upward trajectory, rising from 49.2 percent in 2025 to 49.7 percent in 2026 on a purchasing power parity basis, according to the document titled "Asian Economic Outlook and Integration Progress Annual Report 2026." The foundations of Asian trade integration have continued to strengthen, the report noted, citing data that intra-regional trade dependence edged up from 56.3 percent in 2023 to 57.2 percent in 2024, as major economies across the region increasingly orient their trade ties toward one another.
And, finally, the region also continues to be the world's premier destination for foreign direct investment, one reason for that being that the global epicenter of artificial intelligence development is progressively shifting from Europe and the United States toward Asia.
So, if you want your nation to shine in such environment, you get yourself a Russian nuclear power plant, among other things. To add, Vietnam is by far not the only one in that respect, so a bit of hurry with signing the Moscow agreement was only prudent.
Finally, that deal was a kind of a landmark for Rosatom. According to energy experts, by signing the Moscow agreement, Rosatom has outperformed its only serious competitor, that’s China. Racing China is definitely not Russia’s national goal, but, in any case, it so happens now that China leads the world in current domestic projects, while Russia is now an indisputable leader in building power plants abroad. Projects in India, Bangladesh, Egypt or Turkey are the proof of that, and the corporation has contracts only for fuel supply to last it until the end of the century.
Dmitry Kosyrev is a Russian writer, author of spy novels and short stories. He also did columns for the Pioneer and Firstpost.com