According to AEOI, the new batch was delivered based on the schedule of the Iranian and Russian side for the power plant’s annual refueling.

The Russian Embassy also said in a tweet that, “thanks to efforts of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, [Russian nuclear corporation] Rosatom and the Russian Foreign Ministry, a new batch of nuclear fuel was delivered to the Bushehr NPP. It was necessary for further functioning of the reactor.”

On April 12, a deputy head of Iran’s atomic agency, Mahmoud Jafari, announced that Bushehr’s Unit 1 will be temporarily shut down for refueling and technical maintenance in the run-up to the peak season in summer.

The Bushehr facility sits 17 kilometers southeast of the city of Bushehr along the Persian Gulf coast in southwestern Iran.

The power plant started operating in 2011 and reached its full capacity the following year.

In 2014, Russia signed a cooperation contract with Iran to help build the second and third Bushehr reactors, which are scheduled for launch in 2024 and 2026, respectively.

Iran has repeatedly enunciated its nuclear program as exclusively civilian, subject to the most intensive UN supervisions ever.

Tehran signed a nuclear deal in 2015 with six world countries, which forged close cooperation between Iran and the Agency.

The IAEA has been tasked with supervising the technical aspects of the agreement’s implementation.

The US, however, severely undermined the pact by abandoning it in May 2018 despite numerous IAEA reports on Tehran’s full compliance with the deal.

“One of the goals of the current refueling program is that the plant would hopefully produce the required energy during the country’s peak electricity consumption in the summer,” added Mahmoud Jafari, deputy head of AEOI, on Sunday.

After the refueling is done, the production of electricity will resume in the first unit of the nuclear power plant according to the timetable, he said.

Since its inauguration, the plant has provided 43 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity to the country’s electrical grid, Jafari said, noting that from the last refueling in May 2019 till now, the plant has produced 7.2 billion kilowatt-hours of energy.

The Bushehr facility sits 17 kilometers southeast of the city of Bushehr along the Persian Gulf coast in southwestern Iran.

The Bushehr power plant started operating in 2011 and reached its full capacity the following year.

In 2014, Russia signed a cooperation contract with Iran to help build the second and third Bushehr reactors, which are scheduled for launch in 2024 and 2026, respectively.

As reported, the President of ASE Group of Companies of the Russian Federation’s power equipment and service exporter, Atomstroyexport, Alexander Lokshin also attended the event.

On November 2, IAEO chief Ali Akbar Salehi informed of Iran’s intention for laying concrete foundations of units 2 and 3 of Bushehr nuclear power plant, underlining that Iran will continue its discovery and extraction plans powerfully and that under JCPOA, the country had not abdicated its rights but had only accepted time and numerical restrictions.

As previously reported, the second unit of the Bushehr nuclear power plant is scheduled to come on stream in 6 years, while the third unit will be finished in 8 years.

The 2nd and 3rd units of the plant will increase the share of nuclear power in Iran’s electricity supply to amounts well beyond the current 2.7 percent.

In November 2014, the Nuclear Power Production and Development Company of Iran (NPPD) and Russia’s Atomstroiexport signed two contracts to work on parts of the 2nd and 3rd units.

A total of $10 billion has been allocated for the construction of the two units.

The capacity of the second phase is expected to stand above 1,000 megawatts (MW). The total capacity of the two units of WWER-1,000 (Water-Water Energetic Reactor) will be 2,100 megawatts.