South Korea to construct nuclear plants in Saudi Arabia

SEOUL - - According to the Arabic-language Okaz newspaper on Sunday, South Korea's Engineering and Construction Company SK E&C signed a deal with Saudi Arabia for the design, construction and development of nuclear plants based on the System-integrated Modular Advanced Reactor SMART technology over a span of 30 months until late-2018. The construction of the plant is due to be carried out with the assistance of South Korea's Atomic Energy Research Institute KAERI.

The contract is estimated to cost around 63.3 billion South Korean won 205 million Saudi riyals.

In March 2015, KAERI signed an agreement with Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah City for Nuclear and Renewable Energy KA-CARE to assess the potential for building at least two South Korean SMART reactors in that country.

The kingdom has no industrial nuclear power plants, but has big plans for developing nuclear energy.

During the nuclear talks between Iran and P5+1 group of countries - the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany - in mid-2015, Saudi Arabia signed agreements with France, Russia and South Korea for the construction of nuclear facilities.