MOSCOW, October 7 (RIA Novosti) - Hydropower company RusHydro will raise loans worth 7 billion rubles ($230 million) in 2010 to restore a Siberian hydropower plant severely damaged during a recent accident, the company's acting CEO said Wednesday.
The August 17 disaster at the Sayano-Shushenskaya plant on Siberia's Yenisei River killed 75 people and destroyed a turbine hall.
"Additional borrowings as a whole to fulfill RusHydro's investment program in 2010, including the repair of the Sayano-Shushenskaya hydropower plant, will amount to 7 billion rubles," Vasily Zubakin said.
Zubakin said the company was holding negotiations with Russian banks and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development on raising this sum "on the most acceptable terms at the minimum interest and maximum maturity."
Russian Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin earlier said that measures to repair the Sayano-Shushenskaya hydropower plant in 2010 would be financed from extra-budgetary funds.
Meanwhile, Energy Minister Sergei Shmatko said that expenses for the repair of the Sayano-Shushenskaya hydropower plant in 2009-2010 were approved at 21.6 billion rubles ($720 million), adding that a new share issue and loans were considered as potential sources of financing.
Damage from the disaster has been estimated at over 7.338 billion rubles ($244 mln), according to the probe. The sum includes the loss from the wreckage of major power generating assets, and environmental damage, preliminarily put at some 7 billion rubles ($232.4 mln) and about 63 million rubles ($2 mln), respectively.
