‘The original project of South Ural nuclear power station is going to be edited,’ the Director of the Station Vladimir Morozov announced at today’s press conference. According to Mr Morozov, the project (which had been approved of and licensed) provided for the construction of the nuclear power station based on three BM-800 fast reactors. ‘However, taking into account that all the earlier projects on nuclear power industry development were never completed, as well as the fact that fast reactors are normally designed for a specific purpose and will only be actually needed no sooner than

So far, Russian Copper Company has invested $210m into its joint venture with Kazakhmys Corporation set up for the development of Koktausskoye deposit (named in honour of the 50th anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution) in Kazakhstan, reports their spokesperson. The opening ceremony of a processing plant at the deposit took place on September 7, 2006. The ore mining and processing enterprise located there now includes an open-cast mine, a processing plant that mainly deals in ore concentrate, and a plant that produces cubic-shaped chips from the overburden. The construction of this complex

The amount of tickets booked and sold online now makes up 3% of all the tickets sold by Ural Airlines in Yekaterinburg. The figure only constituted 1% three months ago. Should the regional clients keep up with this pace of mastering online booking, the amount of tickets sold online may reach the average global figure of 30% by February 2007, or within a year of the introduction of the service. E-ticketing in Russia is affected by the limited ability of the airports to support online booking technologies and by the companies being reluctant to invest as well as by the lack of the necessary

Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank rated 134th in the Top 300 rating held among Russia’s largest all-purpose banks in first half of 2006. The data provided by RosBusinessConsulting Information Agency that carried out the rating procedure indicate that Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank scored 1,296 points. The agency used information on the bank’s net wealth, quick assets, owned capital, balance sheet total, loan and deposit portfolios, and profit, reports the spokesperson for Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank.

The dismantling of the old 100/2000 exchange has been almost completed at Vanadium Ore Mining and Processing Enterprise of Kachkanar (part of Evraz Group). The company has been upgrading its telephone communication facilities since 1999. Now the old exchange is to be replaced by the new digital automatic switching center (type 64). The final stage of replacements started on September 25, 2006. It will result in canceling some 1,000 phone numbers and re-creating them in the digital exchange format. This will mainly affect the subscribers located within the production sites of the enterprise

The recent visit of French Minister for Foreign Trade Christine Lagarde to Yekaterinburg resulted in the official proposal to set up a French Consulate in the city. The Consulate will start operating on January 1, 2007. In the meantime, one representative of the French legation will start working as early as tomorrow. What is more, another result of the visit was the decision to significantly build up French export to Russia.

Vanadium Ore Mining and Processing Enterprise of Kachkanar (part of Evraz Group) has recently put into operation the new portals meant for dismantling and assembling wheel-motor blocks. These portals are a complex set of mechanisms that raise the quality of repairs and reduce the time needed to do them. Prior to the introduction of the portals, the dismantling and assembling procedure was performed manually and was extremely time-consuming. Now it is fully automated. The portals were designed based on the special order of the enterprise and include all-purpose equipment that allows to repair

The public prosecution authorities of Ural Federal District have assessed the results of environmental monitoring of the regional businesses. It appears that the environment of the Urals is still in very poor condition, which has been proved by over 6,500 instances of companies violating the environmental legislation in 2006 alone. According to the spokesperson for the Public Prosecutor, the violations occur all over the region and involve misuse of forestry, water bodies, and other resources as well as their pollution; besides, companies ignore environmental norms when constructing and using

By the end of the year, 17,000 visas to Czech Republic will be issued in Sverdlovsk Region. This was mentioned by Mr Karel Haranza, Consul General of Czech Republic to Yekaterinburg, during the recent press conference.

Vanadium Ore Mining and Processing Enterprise of Kachkanar JSC, part of Evraz Group, is carrying out acceptance tests of a new type of primed demolition blocks. By order of Rostekhnadzor, the pilot lot of the blocks manufactured from ballistite-type propellant is to be tested at the company’s explosives production plant within a week. It is the second pilot lot of primers received by the Enterprise, both lots come from Bashkiria. According to the order of the Enterprise, the manufacturer made the primed demolition blocks more secure and efficient by placing them into plastic cartridges. The

On September 21, 2006, Chelyabinsk Region Court of Arbitration carried out a preliminary trial of the lawsuit brought by Chelyabinsk Cellular Communications Ltd. (the company uses Tele-2 as its trademark) against Chelyabinsk Department of Russian Federal Antimonopoly Service. The lawsuit concerns an order issued by the defendant that is now being disputed by the plaintiff. The region’s three major cellular communication operators, MTS, UralSvyazInfrom, and Beeline, had earlier complained about Chelyabinsk Cellular Communications Ltd. using a disputable slogan (Tele2 is always cheaper), which

UralFinPromBank decided to expand the range of loans to small-scale business. Their new program allows for an increase in the company’s floating assets as well as provides opportunities to buy things from equipment to real estate and to upgrade the production facilities. The loan could be offered for any term not exceeding three years, with the annual interest rate determined uniquely in each particular case. The loan ranges from 300,000 RUR to 10,000,000 RUR. The preliminary decision as to whether to give a loan is reported to a client within twenty minutes. The obvious advantages of this

The company’s fixed assets have come to 22,995m RUR in the six months of 2006, with 19,232m being the permanent assets and 138m being the financial ones. The floating assets amounted to 9,128m RUR, of which 2,820m were inventory holdings and 5,037m were accounts receivable. Thus, the total assets of the regional potassium maker came to 32,123m RUR. The company’s long-term liabilities come to 7,184m RUR, its short-term liabilities to 5,099m; with short-term loans amounting to 2,593m, bills payable to suppliers and contractors coming to 2,372m, and income tax debt coming to 43m RUR; the other

Former GD Vitaliy Kotenok resigned in order to become Regional Network Director in the company’s headquarters. Maxim Abushaev was appointed acting GD. He says that the appointment of the General Director will have been settled within a month.

‘Chelyabinsk Region market mainly gets strong drinks from the North Caucasus (Beslan and Vladikavkaz), Saint Petersburg, and Chelyabinsk. The latter has two companies that deal in producing non-refined spirit (Veles Ltd. and Alexandra Ltd.). So far, 99% of the recent poisonings have been caused by the juniper-flavored drink produced by these two manufacturers (as far as the label claims),’ Head of Chelyabinsk Region Department of RosPotrebNadzor (a consumer rights surveillance service) Anatoliy Semenov announced at the press conference. ‘However, the investigation of the poisonings revealed

The construction of No. 5 blast-furnace at Metallurgical Industrial Complex of Nizhny Tagil JSC (part of Evraz Group) has reached its final stage. The builders completed mounting of the stoves, the furnace unit and the casting beds. All parts of the blast-furnace equipment, including the software, have already been tested. The first hot proving of all the furnace complex units is scheduled for September 26, 2006. The blast-furnace will be able to produce about 1.7m tons of cast iron annually. It is equipped with the fully enclosed casting beds and a new external cooling system; it will also

The industrial enterprises of Sverdlovsk Region have produced 46.3bn RUR worth of goods (apart from weapons and ammunition) in the eight months of the year. The production of oil field equipment has gone up by 60.9%, that of drilling rigs by 58%; the volume of ac generator output has increased by 39.4%, that of large motor generating units by 15.8%, that of medical equipment by 67%, that of computer-aided facilities and appliances by 53%, that of haulers by 36%, reports the spokesperson for Sverdlovsk Region Ministry of Industry, Power Engineering and Science.

The French visitors will take part in the proceedings of a business forum in Yekaterinburg on September 25, 2006. A similar event will take place in Moscow as well. The local forum will be attended by the French Minister for Foreign Trade Christine Lagarde, who is going to meet the local entrepreneurs interested in doing business with their French counterparts. The Minister is planning to have a look at the construction site of Auchan and a five-star premium class hotel. The French party includes representatives of over 30 companies dealing in metallurgy, construction activity, woodworking,

Former CEO of Klyuchevsk Ferroalloy Works Sergey Odinokov was appointed First Deputy GD of Russian Special Alloys Management Company. He will now assist the current General Director Sergey Gilvarg. Vladimir Dorokhov was appointed the company’s Financial Department Director, Maxim Balakin was appointed Economics Department Director, and Nikolai Kuzmin became CEO of Klyuchevsk Ferroalloy Works. A number of top managers from Russian Chrome 1915 will now combine their jobs with the positions in the management company. Valeriy Ladygin was appointed Chrome Compound Production Counselor to GD, Yuriy

‘Unfortunately, Eureka Mining is not the most transparent company in the world; this is why it is rather difficult to get any information on its finances. It certainly is involved in a lot of projects all over the world, yet developing Mikheevskoye deposit will require at least $300m,’ the expert of FINAM Investment Company Alesya Breenkova said to UrBC representative. ‘Given the money the company has already invested in the project, it might be actually short of money, which is why Eureka Mining is likely to cooperate with a large Russian mining and metallurgical enterprise. Besides, Eureka